


All the Way

by ensorcel



Category: Military Wives (2020)
Genre: Alternate Universe - 1950s, Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, F/F, F/M, Grief/Mourning, Minor Character Death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-08
Updated: 2020-12-08
Packaged: 2021-03-10 03:08:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 23,112
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27963533
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ensorcel/pseuds/ensorcel
Summary: Lisa was the first friend Kate ever had. Then, she dropped the greatest gift into Kate's arms and left without much more than a word. It's 1955, and Kate doesn't know what to do.A character study set in the early twentieth century. A look at grief, betrayal, and love.
Relationships: Kate Barkley & Lisa Lawson, Kate Barkley/Lisa Lawson
Comments: 8
Kudos: 12





	All the Way

**Author's Note:**

  * For [atlantisairlock](https://archiveofourown.org/users/atlantisairlock/gifts).



> historical accuracy here is minimal at best. you're not here for a history lesson and i have not given it to you. just 23k of gay angst because i'm a clown. enjoy!
> 
> EDIT (04.03.2021): the ever amazing [elizabethboland](https://archiveofourown.org/users/elizabthboland) made this lovely, beautiful edit inspired by this story! check it out [here](https://twitter.com/kathrnclifton/status/1367695157924093953?s=20) to check it out. thank you so so much, i owe my entire world <33

> _“Little buzzing bird can you sing?_
> 
> _It’s cold, lonely, and quite here,_
> 
> _Please me with the music you bring_
> 
> _Rain falls softly on your gentle wing,_
> 
> _Tell me if the storm gets rough,_
> 
> _Little buzzing bird can you sing?_
> 
> _Frost creeps with a biting sting,_
> 
> _Crawling up on leaves and stems,_
> 
> _Please me with the music you bring_
> 
> _A small breeze sweeps into spring,_
> 
> _Blooming flowers and pouring showers,_
> 
> _Little buzzing bird can you sing?_
> 
> _Tell me if the sunny rays on which you cling,_
> 
> _Have any chance of going out,_
> 
> _Please me with the music you bring_
> 
> _I could maybe dance to your mild swing,_
> 
> _There is a pattern here, I think,_
> 
> _Little buzzing bird can you sing?_
> 
> _Please me with the music you bring.”_
> 
> —[BeautifulSheep](https://archiveofourown.org/users/BeautifulSheep), “Little buzzing bird”

Lisa was the first friend Kate ever had. She lived just three houses down the street—right by the broken lamp post, at the bottom of the giant hill that eclipsed their little neighbourhood—and Kate introduced herself to a hopscotching Lisa with a firm hand and a bright smile. 

Lisa smiled back. 

“Can I join you?”

“Yes!” Lisa replied, throwing Kate a piece of chalk. “Sorry, I only have blue.” 

Kate said it was fine and they played the afternoon away, until the sun set, until their mothers called them for dinner, and Kate told Lisa that she lived just down the street and the next day, Lisa was on her doorstep and Kate was being dragged out before she was ready and she complimented Lisa on her dress. 

“Thanks! It’s my Sunday best,” she proudly exclaimed, tugging out her skirt, emphasizing on the nice materials that her family had surely spent a good penny on. Kate looked down at her feet, at her battered up black shoes, her very-not Sunday best. 

“It’s my Mum,” Kate began slowly. “She’s not too well and we weren’t able to make it today.” She scratched her neck, feeling the scruffy fabric of her shirt. 

“Oh,” Lisa said. “I hope your mum gets better.” She threw her another piece of chalk and told her jokes and asked if her mum if Kate could come over and her mum said yes and Kate was in the small, but cozy little kitchen of the Johnson’s home and Kate had a meal she hadn’t made for the first time in ages. 

“Mrs. Johnson, this is really good! Thank you so much for having me,” she said politely, tapping the sides of her mouth with her napkin, then placing it back daintily into her lap just like her schoolteacher had taught in class.

“Don’t worry about it darling,” Lisa’s mum replied, taking her plate as she finished. “Why don’t you girls play in the living room for a little? I’ll let your mother know that you’ll be home a little later, Kate.”

Lisa and Kate exchanged a look and bounded out of their seats. Lisa flopped down onto the couch and leaned forward towards Kate. 

“What do you want to do?” she asked, bright-eyed and light. Kate thought for a second. 

“I don’t know,” she began slowly. “What if you showed me your room?” 

Lisa sprung up and grabbed Kate’s hand, almost pulling her towards the stairs. “Why didn’t I think of that?” 

Kate beamed and looked at all the little trinkets that littered Lisa’s bright, warm room—very similar to the rest of the Johnson’s home. Kate thought about the closed drapes all over her house and the dark rooms and the stifling warmth because her mother couldn’t stand the cold and she wanted to live forever in Lisa’s room. 

She almost told Lisa that. 

Everyday after school, Kate would either run to Lisa’s or Lisa’s to Kate’s and they’d waste their afternoons away on the sidewalks, practicing their dances or their drawing skills or sometimes, they would climb up to the top of the hill that overlooked Woodschurch, completely out of breath once they’d reached the grassy height, and collapse into the soft ground. 

“Imagine we could touch the sky,” Lisa wondered, reaching her hand out. 

Kate scoffed. “We can’t,” she pointed out. Lisa turned her head and stuck her tongue out. 

“I know we can’t, stupid, but what if? I bet we could touch the sky from here,” she commented, staring up at the clouds. 

Kate couldn’t help but agree. 

Kate’s mother died when she was thirteen. The doctor said it was chronic illness, but Kate knew better. She saw the noose in the bedroom before her father was able to whisk her away. 

She tried to muffle her cries into her pillow that night, but she didn’t think she was that successful. Lisa knocked on her door the next day, but she didn’t answer and her father did instead and she didn’t see Lisa’s rejected face when she went back home. Kate wished that she could’ve said sorry, but all she could think about was whether or not if this was how her mother felt, every single day of her life. 

The funeral was a couple of days afterwards and Kate caught a glimpse of Lisa and her family at it, somewhere in the middle row, heads bowed and dressed in black like everyone else was and Kate wished that Lisa was at the front with her. 

Right after, before Kate could even talk to Lisa, before Kate could even get to the middle pew, her father pulled her aside and told her that they were moving to Liverpool because his job was there and Kate wanted to scream that she was basically alone when mother was still here and that she didn’t need him, that it was Lisa that she wanted to stay with, that this was her best friend and Kate didn’t have any of those. 

But she didn’t say anything and packed up her things and left Lisa a letter because they would be leaving early in the morning and she wanted her to know that she would always be her best friend. No matter what. 

Kate couldn’t help but glance back on the car ride, but when she did, she found that she couldn’t look away. 

Kate started high school later that year and she found that she was good at most things—had good grades, was on the cheerleading team, and found herself in the arms of a couple of boys in her eleventh year. Like most girls did, she moved on from her childhood friends and met other ones, some nice some not, but every once in a while, Kate wondered how Lisa was doing and if she was happy. Lisa never wrote back.

If she ever got to touch the sky. Kate hoped that she had. 

Kate graduated with full honours and as prom queen and on the arm of the handsomest boy in the grade and she was so happy she thought her heart would burst. She thought about Lisa and wondered if she’d be happy for Kate right now. Kate hoped that she would. 

Richard dropped to a knee half a year later in the middle of a meadow that reminded Kate strongly of her childhood hill and she said yes before he could even get the question out and kissed him hard, holding onto him tight and made him promise that he’d never leave her. 

They were married on a bright, warm fall Sunday wearing the Sunday best that Kate had always wished for—her in a nice, proper white dress and a veil that her father had paid for and Richard in a smart suit and they were even able to shell out enough for a photograph that day and Kate thought her heart would simply beat out of her chest. 

She kissed Richard in the beautiful sunlight and thought about their future, thought about all they had ahead of them, and in that moment, Kate thought she was touching the sky. 

Kate’s father died two months after he walked her down the aisle. Stress, the doctor had said when Richard held her hand as they sat in the living room of her father’s house and she believed him. Richard was with her when she cleaned out the place that she’d never quite was able to call home again and held her as she sobbed over the crates of her mother’s clothes that her father’d kept but clearly never taken out. 

They had to wait until the spring to bury her father and it wasn’t in the plot beside her mother and Kate wondered when she should’ve noticed the signs because they were all there. (There was jewellery still wrapped up that obviously wasn’t for her mother and five-year-old abandoned perfumes.) 

Remembered how she felt when Father told her that they were moving and how mad she was, how distraught, how she wanted to kick and scream and say her words but never did. She wondered if that was what truly killed her mother. 

Kate buried her father on the outskirts of Liverpool without much fanfare and Richard holding her hand and suddenly, there was nothing else holding her to this cold, lonely city and Kate wanted to see her mother again. 

They drove up to Woodschurch and while she stared out the window as Richard drove, she wondered if Lisa still lived there, if Lisa was happy, if Lisa had found all the things she’d wanted when they were kids. 

“We’re here,” Richard said as he stopped the car and suddenly, Kate was blasted back a decade to her in scruffy clothing and battered shoes and a bright-eyed Lisa and the giant hill that was no longer a grassy mound, but covered in houses. 

Kate wasn’t sure if her heart broke a little, but it sure felt like it. 

They went to the graveyard before her street because for some reason, Kate found it more painful to walk down her childhood neighbourhood than it was to visit her mother’s grave for the first time in years. 

It was smaller than she’d remembered. She clutched a bouquet of white roses that Richard had bought. Her eyes started to burn. 

“Richard, could you, could you give me a moment?” 

Richard, always the good man, always the great man, nodded and stepped aside, walking out of the gate. Kate knelt down at the grave, carefully placing the flowers down. The stone had worn and her mother’s name, Margaret Atkinson, once meticulously carved, had slowly begun to fade. She traced a finger over the dates. 1902 - 1930. Her mother was so young. Kate was almost her age. 

She hoped she was happy now. 

“I—” she tried to speak, still kneeling. Her knees were in the dirt. The words wouldn’t come out. It was like she was twelve again and her father was telling her that they were moving. 

“I’m sorry,” was all she could get out. Sorry that she hadn’t noticed, sorry that she hadn’t realised, sorry that her mother was so unhappy for so much of her life when Kate was out frolicking in the fields with Lisa. 

She got up, rearranged the flowers once again, kissed her hand and placed it into the top of the grave. _I love you. I hope you know that._

Grabbed Richard’s hand and they drove all the way back to Liverpool without visiting her childhood street. Didn’t check if Lisa was still there. 

Kate was first pregnant in the summer of 1937 but she lost the child a few weeks in, common her doctor told her, and they’d postponed their move to Woodschurch to raise a family because there simply wasn’t one. 

Richard held her hand in the hospital room until he was kicked out and Kate had never felt more alone, as the doctor told her that she’d lost her baby, that she’d need a couple of days for recovery, that God had decided this just wasn’t the time for them. 

Kate sobbed on the car ride home while Richard clutched onto her and they fell asleep in each other’s arms in hopes of comforting their loss. 

They moved to Woodschurch—Kate still hadn’t gone back to her childhood street—when Kate was four months into her second pregnancy and the small town was a much better place to raise a family than the ever-growing bustling streets of Liverpool. Kate found a job as a primary schoolteacher and Richard was working in the factories and hopefully his way up the ladder. Kate visited her mother’s grave a week after she’d lost the first baby with a couple of roses. 

They welcomed a beautiful baby boy in the spring of 1938 after a gruelling birth and one miscarriage where Kate thought she was going to die, the first time she truly understood her mother’s plight. 

But when the midwife placed her baby, her little baby boy into her arms, she knew that there was nothing that she wouldn’t do for this child, couldn’t even imagine leaving him for a second and she thought about how her mother was able to do it for good. 

Richard rushed into the room after they’d cleaned her up, grabbed her hand and kissed her forehead. 

“You did so well, Katie,” he whispered, kneeling beside both of them. “I’m so proud of you.” 

She closed her eyes and held him and their baby close. “I love you,” she said. Richard’s eyes were bright as he caught glimpse of his son. 

“I love you, too.” 

They both stared, mesmerized by their son. Their beautiful baby boy. 

“I think James is a good fit,” Kate said quietly, brushing his incredibly small, squished cheek. “You were right, we would know.”

Richard smiled and nodded. “I think James is perfect.” He leaned over and kissed her softly, gently. 

They both laughed as James let out his first cry. 

James was a loud baby. He also shot up like a tree, so quick that Kate had resigned to just buying him clothes that were too big because he’d eventually grow into them. Richard’d come home everyday to a steaming dinner and hopefully, a happy Jamie and an oftentimes exhausted Kate but this was a life that she’d always wanted, the life that she’d dreamt about when she sat at the top of that grassy hill with Lisa all those years ago and tried to reach for the sky. 

She wondered if Lisa was still in Woodschurch. 

They went to church every Sunday and James always had his Sunday best and Richard became fast friends with the pastor. It was a small town with a small life and a small family and Kate’s heart beamed every time she thought about her family and the life she’d made. 

It wasn’t until England declared war on Germany on 1 September of 1939 when everything went downhill. 

Richard was drafted when Jamie was two and Kate still too busy juggling a job and motherhood and now she’d be losing her husband too. 

“Come home to me,” she whispered in his ear, holding onto him. She remembered their wedding day, when she’d made him promise that he’d never leave her. “Please come home.”

Richard looked at her sadly and gave James one last kiss. Kate hefted him up on her hip. “Say bye-bye to Papa,” she instructed, taking James’ thumb out of his mouth. Richard smiled at him. 

“I’ll be back before you know it,” he sang, brushing James’ cheek. 

“I love you,” he said. “I love you, I’ll write, and I love you.”

He kissed her hard, like he was never coming back, like this would be the last time, and Kate could taste her tears between their lips. 

“I love you,” she replied. “I love you!” she called again as he walked down the street. She clutched Jamie to her chest as he waved as well. She watched his figure disappear into a small speck. 

_Please, God, let him come back. If anything in the world, please let him come home._

Kate rushed down into town on her lunch break, running into the vinyl store to pick up a record that she’d forgotten for her ballroom dancing class. The door gave a little ding when she entered and she scanned around for the classical piece she was looking for.

“Anything I can help you with?” 

Kate froze. 

She knew that voice. 

She whipped around, trying to keep herself composed but knew that she couldn’t. 

“Lisa?” she asked, astounded. “Lisa Johnson?” 

And there she was. Almost like Kate had imagined for all those years, still a redhead, though much taller than her now, messily dressed with a pencil perched on her ear. Lisa blinked. 

“Kate? Kate Atkinson? Is that really you?” 

Kate laughed. “Barkley now, but yes.”

Her eyes were burning. 

“I thought you’d moved to Liverpool!” Lisa exclaimed, coming out from behind of the counter. _I told you that I’d moved to Liverpool._

“I did,” Kate said, pulling Lisa in for a hug. She was so warm, just like Kate’d remembered. “You’ve grown up well.”

Lisa chuckled. “I could say the same for you.” 

_I’m so sorry I never told you in person. I’m sorry I left without much more than a letter,_ Kate wanted to say, but it was so long ago that she wasn’t even sure if Lisa remembered and it was such a childish thing to dwell on, and Kate was Kate and she was still the same person her father had told that they were moving to Liverpool and she hadn’t said anything at all. 

“What brings you back?” Lisa asked, head tilted. She had changed so much but at the same time, not at all. Kate wondered if this was God saying a small sorry for sending Richard off to the war. 

“I moved back a couple of years ago, when we found out that we were pregnant,” Kate explained. Hoped that Lisa wouldn’t ask—

“You should’ve reached out then! I had no idea,” Lisa commented, looking at her brightly. _Yes, I should’ve. I should’ve._

“Well, it looks like you’re in a rush, so let me help you with whatever you need and we can catch up later,” Lisa said. Kate wanted to say that no, she wasn’t in a rush (though she was), that she wanted to catch up now, but she heard herself say Bach’s Concerto No. 6 and she was out the door with a _ding_ and Lisa’s number in her hand. 

She beamed harder than she had in ages and talked to James about it all night. 

She stuck Lisa’s number scribbled onto a small scrap of paper onto the fridge, right beside the photos of James that they were barely able to afford and Kate sighed a little when she realised how empty their cupboards were. 

“Mummy’s going to see an old friend, today,” she cooed at James, bouncing him on her hip. He was a little heavy—he was getting big. “Do you want to come with me?”

James looked at her with wide eyes and clapped his hands. “Yes! Yes! Come with Mummy,” he shouted, giggling. Kate kissed his forehead and pulled him close. 

“We’re going on a little trip, then,” she told him as she locked up the house and walked down the street to the bus stop. “We’re going to see where Mummy grew up!” She placed him down and held his hand as he waddled with her. 

“Grew up?” he asked, curious. Kate grinned. 

“Where Mummy lived when she was your age!” 

James clapped again and tugged on her skirt to be lifted. She rolled her eyes but picked him up anyways.

They reached Kate’s childhood street and she was both surprised and unsurprised that Lisa had stayed. Stayed when Kate had not. But first, they had something else to do. 

“This way, James,” she guided, pulling him along and wished that she had a stroller like those high-class women did back in Liverpool. 

“Yes Mummy,” he said, holding onto his stuffed bunny. They walked through the gates of the graveyard and Kate pulled out the small bouquet of flowers she had picked from their neighbour’s front lawn. 

“We’re meeting your Granny today,” Kate whispered, holding onto James’ hand tight. She knelt down, until she was his height, and pulled him close. “She was my mother.”

James looked at her with large eyes. “Granny?” 

“Yes,” Kate said. “She left us a long, long time ago, but she loves you very much.” Or at least Kate had hoped. James shoved his bunny’s ear into his mouth. “Oh darling, don’t do that,” she chided gently. 

“Granny gone?” 

Kate nodded. “But we come here to remember her, to tell her that we love her.” 

James clapped his hands again, dropping his bunny into Kate’s grasp. “We love you!” he called, with all the grace of a toddler and a child too young to truly understand what was going on. 

Kate’s eyes burned but she held onto her son tight and kissed him hard. He squirmed a little in her arms, but stayed put once she gave him back his bunny. She brushed his soft hair out of his eyes. 

“Meet your grandson,” Kate whispered, brushing her fingers against her mother’s name. “We’re so happy, Richard and I. I hope you know that.” _I hope you’re happy for me. I miss you._

James babbled whilst she set the flowers down. Her eyes were burning a little. He sang quietly, bumping a little into her cheek. 

“Mummy?” 

“Yes?” 

“Why are you crying?” he asked, placing his small hands on her face. Kate tried to smile. 

“Mummy’s not crying,” she said, steading her voice. James clumsily wiped her tears away. Kate wanted to laugh. 

“Mummy no sad,” he said brightly. “No sad, I’m here.” He wrapped his small arms around her as much as he could. Kate held on tight. 

“Oh darling, Mummy knows. I’m always here for you,” she said firmly. “I love you.” She hadn’t said it enough to her mother and barely to her father and now they were both dead. 

“Love you too,” James called, clapping his hands again. Kate kissed him on the forehead and picked him up, almost throwing him up in the air. 

Kate rearranged the flowers on the grave one more time before she placed James down and they walked out of the graveyard, hand in hand. 

She took a deep breath once they reached the street, glancing up to the giant hill that wasn’t so giant no longer—was she just young then, or had they shortened it?—and up to the third house from the lamp post. 

It looked the exact same. Kate glanced to the house that was once her own, the one she had grown up in and the one her mother had died in. It was a little run down, but there were a couple of small bikes in the front yard and it looked like it was recently mowed. Kate could hear the laughter of children in the distance and though it was small and it was poor, this was Kate’s home and she thought her heart was going to burst at the sight of it. 

She held onto James a little tighter. 

“Come on, this way darling,” she chided gently, pulling him along the street as he looked around with wide eyes. “This is where Mummy grew up.” 

James’ small mouth dropped open a little and Kate just smiled. They reached Lisa’s porch and Kate’s hand hovered a little over the knocker. Well. Lisa had invited her over for tea, hadn’t she? 

The house looked like it’d been repainted, but aside from that, nothing had changed from the decade Kate was gone from little Woodschurch. 

James was chewing on his bunny again when Kate finally knocked and after a couple of footsteps from inside, Lisa showed up, looking eerily like her mother and Kate was knocked back to when she first was invited to the Johnson’s home and how welcoming it was and how good Lisa’s mother’s cooking was. She wondered if Mrs. Johnson was still alive. 

“Hey Kate!” Lisa greeted, smiling. God, it’d been so long since she’d seen her. Kate smiled back. 

“I brought James along, I hope you don’t mind,” she quickly explained, tugging on her son’s hand. “James, say hi to Miss Johnson,” Kate instructed and she was glad that Lisa didn’t correct her. 

“Hello, Miss Johnson,” James said politely, looking up at her. Lisa beamed. 

“Hello there, young man,” she replied, kneeling down. “Why, you look just like your mother!” 

Kate just laughed. “If anything, he looks more like his father,” she countered. 

“Please, come in,” Lisa said, getting up. “Don’t want this young man here to freeze, do we?” James giggled and followed Lisa into the house, warm and inviting just as Kate had always remembered. 

“Thank you for having us,” Kate said as Lisa took her coat. “It’s been so long.” 

Kate wondered if Lisa ever read her letter and if she ever considered writing back. She hefted James up, settling him on the couch of the living room where she and Lisa used to play. It was less cluttered now, she supposed. 

“Here, I have some old toys of mine to keep him busy,” Lisa said with a wink and disappeared down the hall. Kate took the time to properly take a look around. Everything seemed smaller, though she supposed that was because she’d grown up. Everything looked so big then. “Here, James,” Lisa said as she came back, with a stuffed bear and a small puzzle kit. 

“What do you say, James?” 

“T’ank you, Miss Johnson!” he cheered, clapping his hands and smiling. Lisa chuckled and tousled his hair. 

“Here,” Lisa indicated, pulling out a chair for Kate at the dining table, where they could still see James playing on the ground. “How do you take your tea?”

“A little sugar, no cream, thank you,” Kate absentmindedly said, still watching James. 

“So, Kate _Barkley_ ,” Lisa drawled, setting down two piping hot cups. Kate smiled and warmed her hands with it. 

“Yes, Richard, we met in high school,” she explained, looking at Lisa. Her hair had gotten redder over time but her eyes were just as bright and lovely as they were when they were children. Lisa grinned. 

“Not surprised that you got married first,” she teased, elbowing Kate. Kate laughed a little. 

“What about you? Still in this little town, I see,” Kate commented, sipping at her tea. 

“With someone right now,” she just said, with a twinkle in her eye. “It’s a bit of a secret.” 

Kate’s eyebrows raised. 

“Oh?” 

“Maybe I’ll tell you later,” Lisa said with a wink and Kate had never felt this comfortable, this at home—not even with Richard. 

“It’s good to be back,” she remarked, looking out the window into the Johnson’s small, but well-kept backyard.

“Good to have you back,” Lisa said back, grabbing Kate’s hand. It was warm from her cup. 

They talked about everything and anything in between, Kate’s years in Liverpool, Lisa’s life in Woodschurch, Richard off at the war, Lisa’s job as a clerk, Kate’s job as a teacher, and how lovely James was and how lovely it was to be in the same town again. 

Kate left with a spring in her step and a sleepy James in her arms but when she caught the bus home, her chest was bursting and she wondered if she’d ever been this happy since James’ birth. 

Eventually, Kate would drop by Lisa’s after work, right before rushing home to James because her house was just on the way and Kate didn’t have many friends in Woodschurch and Richard was off in the war and there was only so much she could do to keep herself busy. 

The news was filled with German bombers and German tanks and how the men afar were doing and the letters from Richard were starting to go from weekly ones to monthly ones and Kate was getting worried.

James was shooting up like a tree and Kate hoped that she wouldn’t need to buy him more clothes because they were already getting tight on her teacher’s salary and Richard’s small packages from the frontlines. Every night, she would read aloud Richard’s letters to James, whispering in his ear that _this is your father, your Papa, and he loves you so much, he loves us so much—all he can talk about these letters is you, Jamie._

She wanted to tell Richard to stop calling him Jamie, that his name was James, but all Kate was glad that he was still alive and she hadn’t gotten a man dressed in military clothing on her doorstep and prayed that she never would. 

After a hard day at work and with the babysitter staying a little later, Kate dropped by Lisa’s, hoping she didn’t have a shift and wondered if she wanted to drop by the pub for a drink. 

Lisa grinned at her suggestion. “I wondered if I needed to drag you there myself,” she commented, grabbing her coat. “Drinks are on me.”

Kate smiled and looped her arm through Lisa’s on the bus ride there. Lisa didn’t let go. The pub was a little cold and very damp, but they served beer and that was enough for Kate, whose experience with alcohol was limited to half a shot of vodka underneath the bleachers in high school.

Kate was a little nervous but Lisa was here and Lisa looked lovely and Lisa was always there, even when Kate left without any more than a letter and she never wrote back. 

“Come on,” Lisa said, grabbing Kate’s hand. “Dance with me!” 

The jukebox was playing some song Kate didn’t recognize because she could barely afford food for her and Jamie some nights, nevermind records for them to listen to. Lisa held her close and rocked her back and forth and she was so close and she was so warm—

“We can’t be seen like this,” Kate heard herself whisper. “People will talk.” 

Lisa just raised an eyebrow and looked at her. “Then let them talk.” 

Kate told herself she wasn’t really sure what Lisa meant, told herself that she was married with a husband in the war and a son at home and a family to take of, but she let herself sway to the music with Lisa, their skirts touching, their hands winding, and Lisa’s eyes bright. 

The song changed but they stayed on the dance floor, holding onto each other, listening to the new music, Lisa humming it in her ear, Lisa holding her hand, Lisa right by her when Richard wasn’t, Lisa, Lisa, Lisa, who has somehow become a constant in Kate’s life when she wasn’t even looking. 

They had another drink and then Kate had to go home because she had Jamie and Lisa had her mother and they both had their own, very separate lives and Kate wasn’t even sure what it meant when she looked at her best friend and thought she was the most beautiful woman in the world. 

Lisa gave her a kiss on the cheek and a wave and was gone on the next bus. 

Kate was warm even though the air was cold and it was December and her husband was away fighting a war and her son was at home without her. 

She held Jamie tight and kissed him hard and sang to him all night. 

They spent Christmas and New Year’s together, with Kate at Lisa’s home for Christmas and Lisa at Kate’s for New Year’s. The days were cold and the nights even more so, but Kate was so warm for the first time in years and Jamie was laughing brightly and they’d just received a letter from Richard and Kate could’ve burst, just burst at all the warmth in her chest and in her home and in her life. 

Jamie was already tucked away in bed as it snowed outside and the street lights glowed and the fireplace was blazing and the decorations were as nice as Kate could get them to be and Lisa was in her kitchen as they had some wine that Lisa’d brought over and some cookies that Kate had baked on whim because they were in the middle of a war and it was New Year’s, so there had to be some happiness, wasn’t there? 

Kate wished she had a record player so she could’ve put on some music so they could’ve danced in her small kitchen like they did in the bar, when Lisa was so close and so warm. 

They listened for the large clock tower just a block away from Kate’s house to ring. 

“To new beginnings,” Lisa joked, tiling her glass. Kate laughed. Lisa looked beautiful in the dim light. 

“To our men in the war,” Kate countered. Lisa gave her a tight smile. 

The bell rang once. 

“Five,” Lisa sang. “Four, three, two, one—”

Kate cut her off before she could even say Happy New Year’s. 

Her lips were soft and Lisa was so warm and at first Kate didn’t think she was kissing her back until she was and Kate was kissing her childhood best friend and her current best friend and the only person in the world who was here with her, _right now_ , and she was kissing a woman and she was so beautiful and Kate’s heart fluttered a little—no, a lot in her chest. 

She pulled back and watched Lisa breath heavily. “I’m sorr—”

Lisa was kissing her against the kitchen table that Kate shared with her husband, with her son, and all Kate could think about was how she was kissing her best friend, she was with her _best friend_ , it was Lisa, it was always Lisa, it would always be Lisa. 

“Happy New Year’s,” Kate whispered against Lisa’s lips, breathless. Lisa was holding onto her tight and Kate was so warm and she was filled with hope, for the first time in a long, long one and she just wanted to stay here, in her dingy little kitchen with Jamie upstairs and Lisa in her house and Lisa in her bed. “Stay?” 

Lisa just nodded and held her hand. “Where to, Miss Atkinson?” 

Kate hadn’t heard that name in ages. It’d always been Barkley. She supposed she left a part of it behind when her father and she buried the last of the name. 

Kate just kissed her and led Lisa upstairs, smiling as if her heart would burst, and honestly, she was surprised it didn’t. 

It was 1940, the start of a new decade, the start of a new war, of a second one, and Kate had a warm Lisa in her bed and her son across the hall and her husband across the sea.

Richard’s letters still came, sometimes with more frequency than others, but that was because of the war more than anything else, because he always ended them in his messy handwriting that Kate was always pestering him about, with an _I love you Katie_ because his letters were all about Jamie, all about their son and one week, when Kate was able to scrape up enough money from the bottom of the barrel, she sent him a photo. 

She met with Lisa most days. Dropped by after work like she did before and if she was completely honest—something she found that was becoming easier and harder to her—not much had changed, except they would exchange a kiss once inside because that simply wasn’t something they could do on the porch like one would with a husband and another when Kate left and sometimes, just sometimes, when they got lucky, Lisa would be on the bus ride back to Kate’s. 

It became easy. Kate would drop by, Lisa would drop by, they were always together at some point. Kate was with Lisa and Lisa was with Kate even though Kate’s husband was off at the war fighting for a cause whilst his wife slept with another woman. 

She told herself that it wasn’t cheating, because it wasn’t with a man, because it was with Lisa, and she didn’t love Lisa and she loved Richard and made the difference, didn’t it? 

(She was lying to herself and she knew it.) 

Jamie kept on growing, _he’s getting so tall_ , was all she could remark in her letters to Richard, teased him about sending more money home because she’d need it soon to buy Jamie more clothes. Didn’t tell him that things were getting the tightest they’ve been and Kate was looking for a second job. 

Jamie was finally old enough to send to the best daycare Kate could afford—which meant it was the one that was closest to her home and she didn’t have to bus halfway across town to get to—and Kate started taking in more hours at the schoolhouse as she polished up her resume. 

“Long day?” Lisa asked when Kate showed up at her door, feet heavy and face worn.

“Your mother home?” she asked back. She just wanted to kiss Lisa, to hold Lisa, to have Lisa tell her that everything would be okay even when it clearly wouldn’t be. Lisa, Lisa, Lisa. 

“Asleep,” Lisa replied, pointing at the stairs. “You look like you need a drink.”

Kate just nodded and didn’t question where Lisa got her alcohol because the government was starting rations to help with the war effort and it looked as if it was only a matter of time before the war reached Britain. 

Richard hadn’t sent a letter in a month. She tried not to dwell on it. 

As Lisa puttered around in the kitchen, Kate drew the blinds and checked out the windows, just in case. It was a small town and people could, and would, talk. 

Lisa looked so beautiful in the warm glow of her home. Kate dropped her bag and undid her coat and pulled her in, pulled her close, kissing her firmly. She tasted like cold tea, a half-eaten biscuit, and a lot like the wind from when they sat at the top of the hill that no longer was, wanting to touch the sky. 

“Come home with me,” Kate whispered, Lisa’s hand in her own, after she complained about her workday, after she complained about how she needed another job, after she finished up the very nice wine Lisa had given her. 

Like always, Lisa said yes. Like always, Lisa kissed her and Kate kissed her back. The words were just at the tip of her tongue, just waiting to spill out, until she remembered that she had a husband, a man who loved her, who was the father of her child, and Kate told herself that this was just a _thing_ , something that was happening, that it was Richard who she loved. 

Tried to remind that to herself when Lisa’s lips were on her neck and on her breasts and thought about what her mother would’ve thought and what her father would’ve said and what God would’ve said, but Lisa made her feel warmer and purer and lovelier than she had in a long, long time and He really couldn’t fault her for that, could He? 

Lisa didn’t stay the night but she did kiss Kate goodbye and scampered on back home like she always did and Kate wanted to call after her in the dark, to tell her to be safe, but she couldn’t because this was a small town and they were two women and something like her, something like them, simply couldn’t work because it didn’t. 

Kate had heard about the stories of women living together, being together like she and Lisa were together, and how it just wasn’t it because that was the way the world worked. Tried not to think about it and sang to Jamie while he was sleeping because the house was too empty when Lisa wasn’t there. 

Then France fell and so did a little part of Kate’s heart. 

The bombings started about a month later. Richard still hadn’t written and she had no clue where he was. But there were no men on her porch and she took as it as a sign, if it even was one. No idea if he was in France detained by Germany, no idea if he was even _in_ France, no idea if he was even _alive_ at all. 

She clutched onto Jamie tight, tighter than she ever thought she had, like he was her lifeline the first time they were all rushed into barricades and whispered over and over again, _I love you, I love you, I love you, Mama loves you, Papa loves you_ because she hadn’t had enough time with her mother and her father and Richard and if there was anything in the world she wanted, it was for Jamie to know, that to the very last second, his mother loved him. 

Kate didn’t see Lisa the first time round and when they left the bunker with her neighbours, her students, her community, the place she had grown up in and then come back to, buildings were demolished, blown to the ground and Kate prayed that Lisa was safe. That she had Lisa too, out of all of this. 

She didn’t go home—whether or not she was too scared to see if her home was burnt to the ground, she didn’t know—and raced as fast as she could to Lisa’s, with Jamie in her arms and his hair blowing wildly in the wind. 

Was this how Richard felt? Everyday of his life? _God, please let him come home. Please let us be a family again._

And yet she still raced to Lisa’s. 

The street looked relatively fine, bar a couple of broken fences here and there but all the houses were intact and there didn’t seem to have been any deaths—not yet—and Kate was panting once she reached Lisa’s porch and rapidly knocked on the door. 

And knocked again. And again. 

She tried to peer in through the windows but they were tightly drawn. Called for Lisa’s name, called for Lisa’s mother. There was no reply. Kate held onto Jamie with all her might. 

Her heart dropped. 

Knocked again. Wandered down the street and back up again. 

Until she saw a figure coming up the street, a little worn, a little tired, but her hair was just as red as it’d always been and her eyes were just as bright as they’d always been, ever since they were children and Lisa offered Kate a piece of chalk to draw with. She was holding her mother’s hand. 

If this had been another world, another life, another time, Kate would’ve ran into Lisa’s arms and held her and kissed her and told her that she was everything in the world to her, that Lisa was the most beautiful woman she’d ever seen. 

But this wasn’t another world and Kate just stood there with Jamie was she watched her best friend come down the street, walking faster and faster and pull her into a hug. Kate’s eyes teared up a little but she hugged her back hard and wished that she could kiss her. 

Lisa laughed a little, holding Kate’s head. “I’m so glad you’re okay,” she whispered.

“Me too,” Kate said back, completely aware that they were in the middle of the street in the middle of the day, but they were just two friends who needed each other and no one seemed to bat women an eye anyways, so what did they have to lose? “Glad your mother’s okay too,” she added, giving Mrs. Johnson a small nod. 

“Who’s a brave little man?” Lisa cooed, picking Jamie up as he laughed. Kate beamed. 

Wanted to say it. The words were just itching to come out. To tell Lisa everything she hadn’t even been able to admit to herself but wanted to. To tell Lisa everything, that _she_ was everything, that she made Kate happy and that was something that Kate cherished very, very much. It had been a long time since she was last happy. 

Like she was touching the sky. 

“Come on, let’s have a cup of tea,” Lisa chided, grabbing Kate’s arm. “It’s been a long day.” 

It had. 

Kate kissed her the minute they were out of sight from Jamie and Lisa’s mother in the kitchen and and prayed to God that He would not take her away from Kate like He had with so many before her.

They were back into the bunkers four times until a man in military uniform showed up at Kate’s doorstep and her heart sank, her heart dropped, and she wanted to make a run for Jamie who was upstairs, but she just politely invited him in and asked him if he wanted tea. 

There was no envelope in his hands and Kate took it as a good sign. Tried to convince herself that it was going to be okay. That things were going to work out. 

“Mrs. Barkley, I’m sorry to inform you—”

_Don’t say it. Don’t fucking say it._

“That your husband was injured and he is currently recovering in London and will be moved to Liverpool hospital by tomorrow,” he finished, looking her in the eye. Kate gasped, let out a breath she didn’t even know she was holding in, grabbed the solider’s hand and thanked him endlessly. 

Once the door closed with a thud, Kate leaned against it with a hand over her mouth, her eyes burning and her stomach turning, but _Richard was safe, Richard was alive, he was coming home tomorrow, he would be able to see Jamie, I love you so, so much._

She raced upstairs to Jamie’s room and lifted him out of his crib, singing to him softly. 

“Your Papa will be home soon,” she told him and his eyes darted up, finally paying attention after fiddling with the buttons on her shirt. 

“Papa?”

He sounded so hopeful that Kate wanted to cry again. 

“He’s coming home,” she whispered, holding him tight and kissing his forehead. “Coming home.” 

Lisa dropped by later that day and Kate paused before she opened the door. 

“Richard will be back tomorrow,” she said, before she could even welcome Lisa in. 

“Oh,” was all Lisa said. 

“He was injured in France and currently in London, but he’s being transferred up to Liverpool tomorrow,” Kate explained in a rush. She was twisting her fingers, avoiding Lisa’s eyes. 

“That’s so good to hear, Kate,” Lisa said, much happier than before, grabbing onto the sides of her arms and pulling her in for a hug. “So good to hear.” 

_Is it?_

She wanted to slap herself for even thinking it. 

“I was wondering, since it’s such late notice, can you watch Jamie tomorrow when I visit the hospital? I don’t want to bring him just yet—they haven’t told me much about Richard’s condition.” 

Lisa nodded. “Of course, of course.” She ran her hands up and down Kate’s arms. “That’s what friends are for, aren’t they?” 

Kate smiled. Yes. What friends were for.

Lisa stayed to chat for a little and for some tea but Kate didn’t kiss her before she left and Lisa didn’t try and there was no goodbye lest a verbal one and Kate wanted to call after her, tell her all the things she wanted to but couldn’t, tell her to stay, but Richard was coming home and Kate had long learnt that all good things had an expiry date.

The next morning was bright and it was a blue, blue day and Kate got into the car that she’d rarely driven because bus money was cheaper than gas money and things got tight quick. But this time, she raced her way to Liverpool, faster than her father had all those years ago after her mother died, faster than Richard did on their first visit back.

Left Jamie in Lisa’s capable hands with a kiss and one that she desperately wished that she could give to Lisa. To say _thank you, thank you for being here with me, thank you for everything you’ve done, everything you’ve given me and I wish I could give you what you deserve._

“Hi, I’m looking for Private Richard Barkley, I’m his wife,” Kate gasped out after having run from the parking lot into the hospital. The receptionist gave her a look and directed her to the fourth floor in room 467. The elevator could not have taken longer to get to the fourth floor. 

Her eyes frantically scanned all the doors for 467, 467, Richard, Richard, Richard and she wondered if she should’ve brought Jamie along to see his father but when she opened the door, she was very glad that she hadn’t. 

Richard was asleep, peaceful, looking older than Kate had ever seen him and it just hit her that he had been gone for a year and a half and it had been so _long_. He was covered in bandages and breathing heavily and Kate sank into the chair beside the bed, grabbing his hand, holding on tight. 

_Oh Richard._

“Richard,” she whispered, clutching onto his hand as if it would wake him. He was covered from head to toe in white plaster. Kate wanted to crawl right into the bed with him. “I love you,” she added, bowing her head. 

She didn’t know how long she was there until Richard woke, but it was a while and Kate’s back gave a small twinge. 

“Katie?” he coughed a little, voice raspy. Kate gasped and gripped his hand. 

“Richard?”

He slowly blinked awake, trying to shake his head. 

“I’m here,” she whispered, looking him right in the eye. Into those dark, deep brown eyes that she had fallen in love with and the ones that Jamie had. “I’m here.”

“Katie,” he said back, squeezing her hand. 

_I was so so worried. I thought you were dead. I thought you weren’t coming home._

So many things she wanted to say but didn’t. 

“I love you,” she said, almost like a confession, like she hadn’t been kissing and touching Lisa the year and a half he was gone. “I love you.” 

She took Jamie to see him the next day, after the nurses said it was okay for him to see more people—that it would actually help—and she avoided Lisa’s gaze when she got home and tried to keep the mood up as she made dinner and Jamie spat half of it out. 

Richard beamed harder than she’d ever seen him smile when Jamie walked in, barely tall enough to see the bed, but Kate propped him up and he held his father’s hand and her heart was so full she thought it would burst. 

“Papa, we missed you!” Jamie called, beginning to crawl into bed with Richard until Kate pulled him back. 

“Your Papa is still hurt, darling. You need to be more careful,” Kate explained again, looking sternly at Jamie. 

“Nonsense,” Richard said, sitting up a little and reaching out for Jamie. “Come here, big boy.”

Jamie giggled and scampered on his way to Richard, throwing his arms around his Papa as much as he could and burrowed his face into Richard’s shirt. Kate and Richard shared a look and both grinned. 

Even if Richard was in a hospital room, even if he would have difficulty with his leg for the rest of his life, even if things with Lisa were so up in the air Kate had no idea what the hell they were doing, things right now were good and she had her husband and her son and from that, she knew she was luckier than most.

Kissed Richard on the lips before they left as visiting hours were starting to close and promised that they would be back tomorrow with a sloppy kiss on the cheek from Jamie and Kate had to wipe back a tear on their way out. 

The drive back to Woodschurch was long and the roads were dark but she sang songs while Jamie started to shout along and her heart was beating in a way it hadn’t in a long, long time. 

Richard was coming home. 

Kate dropped by Lisa’s house after the doctors told her that Richard would be in hospital for at least another week. 

The door swung open and Lisa looked surprised to see her there. 

“Is your mother home?” Kate asked, twisting her fingers. Lisa frowned. 

“No, she went out with a couple of friends,” she replied, welcoming Kate in and offering to take her coat. 

“No, it’s fine, I won’t be staying long,” Kate quickly said, looking down at her shoes. 

“Is something wro—”

Kate kissed her before she could finish her sentence. Pulled her in with a hand on Lisa’s neck, feeling how warm she was, how soft her hair was, how lovely her lips were and how she was always, always there. Wanted to kiss her for the rest of time. Wanted to hold her for as long as she wanted. 

But there were a lot of things that Kate Barkley wanted that she never got. 

Lisa gasped a little for breath and Kate leaned her forehead against hers. _I love you. I love you. I want to come home to you. I want to live my life with you._

All the things she wanted to say but couldn’t. All the things she wanted to do but couldn’t. Kate held onto Lisa tightly, tighter than she ever had before, tighter than she ever would. 

If this was a nicer world, she would be whispering her apologies into Lisa’s ear, she wouldn’t need to say goodbye at all, she would be able to kiss Lisa in her home without worrying about anyone or anything, but Kate had long learnt that this was not a nicer world and she left with teary eyes and a confused Lisa and a very, very soft _I’m sorry_ before she fled out the door. 

The cold air hit her face, almost whipping it in the winter chill and Kate’s breath could be seen as she exhaled. 

Grabbed the next bus and tried not to cry as she stared out the window. 

This was the right thing. The honourable thing. The _only_ option. 

She got home to a crying Jamie and a dark home and hoped that Richard was able to come back soon but wished even more that Lisa was here. 

Richard came back earlier than expected and Kate wondered if it was normal to feel this way when your husband was in your bed, wondered if Lisa was thinking of her like Kate was, wondered if Lisa was happy and knew, that deep down, Kate had hurt her. Left her again, just like when she was thirteen and her mother had died and her father shipped them off to Liverpool, to Richard. 

So many things she wanted to say but couldn’t. 

Things settled down. Richard came home, he recovered a little more before he went job-hunting and the government’s stipend had helped more than Kate wanted to admit. Jamie was growing up and he was heading to kindergarten soon, which meant that daycare was soon going to be an expense they didn’t need and for the first time in a long while, the Barkleys weren’t pinching pennies and Kate was even able to get Jamie a proper Christmas gift when he was three. 

Kate loved Richard and Richard loved Kate and she told herself that Lisa was just a lapse, something she wanted—no needed—when Richard was gone and now that he was back, things were back to normal and she hadn’t seen Lisa for five whole months.

But it was a small town and things got around—she hoped that she and Lisa never got around; they had been very careful, too careful—and she found that Lisa had moved on, to dating a nice man named Frederick Lawson who worked in a factory that Richard used to before the war. Kate was happy for her. Hoped that she would be able to settle down, to have children, to have a family like she deserved. Lisa deserved that, more than anything. More than Kate. 

She went to work, picked up Jamie on even days, came home, made dinner, cleaned, got Jamie ready for bed, kissed Richard somewhere in between and she was happy. This was the life she wanted. The life her mother was so close to having. 

She visited her mother’s grave later that day, with a fresh batch of flowers that she was able to afford this time—she didn’t need to cut them from her neighbour’s front lawn—and wished that Mother was still alive to see her, to meet her grandson, to see how happy Kate was and how she got everything she wanted. 

Richard kissed Jamie good night before kissing her good night and she fell asleep with the moon streaming in through the window and all Kate could think about was how a year ago, Lisa was in her arms and Lisa was in her bed and Lisa was in her life and she had everything but the one thing she wanted.

The first time Kate saw Lisa after was when she ran into her back at the vinyl store that she still worked at but this time, there was something very different because Lisa was pregnant. Very pregnant. 

Kate tried not to look surprised. She hadn’t even heard of a wedding. 

“It’s good to see you,” Kate said honestly. It was good to see Lisa. Even if she had clearly moved on. Lisa gave her a tight smile. 

“That’ll be two quid,” she replied, handing her back the record Kate needed for class. 

“When’s the baby due?” Kate asked politely. 

“Three months,” Lisa replied sharply. She didn’t look at Kate. Kate supposed she deserved it. “You aren’t going to ask about a possible marriage?” 

Kate turned around just as she was about to leave.

“It isn’t my business,” said Kate, because it wasn’t. “I just hope you’re happy.” 

Lisa didn’t say anything. 

The door closed with a ding. 

They were in bunkers again almost a year after Richard had come home. Jamie was four-almost-five now and she tried not to think about how Richard was shaking, about how he was barely about to make out of the house, and that she never asked about the war because it wasn’t her place and he tried to look fine and Kate just didn’t push. 

She kissed him gently, softly when they got back home and placed Jamie into bed. 

“I’m here for you,” she whispered in his ear, leaning against him. “I love you.”

Richard looked at her, deep into her eyes and she felt like she was being x-rayed. “I know,” he finally said, holding her close and kissing her forehead. “I love you too.” 

And they went to bed like any married couple would and Kate held onto him tight and tried not to think about how haunted he looked back in the dark bunker with Jamie tucked between them and how much he was sweating and how she never asked what it was like in France or Germany or Belgium or wherever the hell he was. 

She fell asleep with her leg hooked with Richard’s and her arms tangled and told herself how much she loved him, how much she loves him, how much she wanted this life with him, how much it meant to her. He gave her everything she could’ve wanted. 

She heard down the grapevine that Lisa’s mother had died and the funeral was in four days. Kate picked out black clothing that she was so glad she didn’t need to wear for Richard and didn’t drop by Lisa’s house like she would’ve. She wished she could have. Wished for so many things. 

She stood in the back, remembering Mrs. Johnson’s warm meals and sweet smile when she was younger, when she and Lisa would play out on the streets. She wondered what had happened to Lisa’s father. 

Lisa was the front. Her eyes were red but she wasn’t crying. Kate wanted to hold her close and kiss her and tell her that she loved her and that they would get through this together but all she did was give her a hug and a kiss on the cheek and condolences whispered in her ear. 

Wished that she could hold Lisa’s hand on the way home. 

She didn’t stay for the small reception at the Johnsons’ home. 

It was a Saturday when there was a frantic pounding on the door and Kate’s neck snapped up from her marking and she glanced at the door suspiciously. Richard and Jamie were both at the park and they had just left. 

She cautiously approached the door and when she peeked through the curtain, she caught glimpse of a lot of red hair. 

“Lisa?” 

She was holding a baby in her arms and she was crying. Kate immediately rushed her into the house. 

“God, Lisa, what’s wrong?”

Lisa’s tears were streaming down her face harder now. “God, Kate, I’m so sorry, please, _please_ , can you take her?” Lisa gently placed her baby into Kate’s arms. “Her name is Frankie and you can give her the last name Lawson or Barkley but please, please, Kate, can you take care of my little girl?” 

Lisa was sobbing and Kate was carrying an infant in her arms and her husband was out and her son wasn’t home and she was frozen as she watched Lisa break down like she had never seen before. 

“I’m, I’m not married—you have to see Kate, you have to _understand,_ ” Lisa gasped out, frantic, shaking Kate’s shoulders. “We just couldn’t—he’s not white and it just couldn’t happen and then—”

_Oh Lisa._

Kate gathered her into her arms as much as she could without waking the baby—Frankie. 

_Oh Lisa._

“Please, Kate, _please_ ,” Lisa begged. “Red—her father—we need to leave now. We can’t be seen together and I have to go but I can’t take Frankie with me, it’s too dangerous and I can’t take Frankie with me—”

Kate let Lisa sob into her shoulder. 

“I’ll take care of her,” she whispered into Lisa’s ear. “I’ll take care of her,” she repeated. She repeated it over and over and over again, rocking Lisa. 

Lisa looked at Frankie swaddled in her blankets in Kate’s arms. “Thank you,” she said. “Thank you, thank you, _thank you_.” 

Lisa kissed her. 

It was short and it was salty and Kate wanted to kiss her forever, to hold her forever, to tell her that she was here to raise Frankie with her, that everything would be okay but that would all be a lie. 

“You’ll be able to reach me here and I don’t know how long I’ll be gone for,” Lisa explained, sliding Kate a piece of paper and straightening up. Her eyes were red but she was no longer crying. 

Suddenly, in her small kitchen with Lisa’s baby in her arms, it hit that this might be the last time Kate would see Lisa, that this might be the end, that Lisa was leaving Woodschurch, just like how Kate left all those years ago. 

The words were at the tip of her tongue, waiting to spill over. To tell Lisa, that she was everything, that even if this was the last time Kate was going to see her, that things would work out. But Kate just stood there, cradling little Frankie, staring at Lisa with tears in her eyes. Wanted to tell Lisa to stay, that she could hide her home, that there wasn’t anything she wouldn’t do. 

“Thank you,” Lisa repeated, squeezing Kate’s shoulders. “ _Thank you._ ” She looked down at Frankie, still in Kate’s arms. “Mummy loves you so much. So so much.” Lisa was crying again.

Lisa kissed Frankie on the forehead one last time and then pulled Kate in by the collar and kissed her hard. Kissed her like she was saying goodbye. 

“Come home to me,” Kate whispered. _Please_. 

Lisa just gave her a sad smile and waved goodbye down the street, never looking back. Kate watched until her figure turned into the smallest speck. 

She clutched onto Frankie. 

Richard came home with a surprised look on his face but he didn’t say anything and just ushered Jamie upstairs. He raised an eyebrow when he came back down. 

“Kate, what is this?” he asked, politely. Kate was reminded of why she married Richard. Stable, kind, loving Richard. Kate didn’t even know where to begin. 

“When you were at war,” she said, keeping her voice as steady as possible. “I met back up with a childhood friend of mine, Lisa Johnson.”

“The pregnant one?” Kate watched as the realisation dawned on his face. “And she’s asked you to take care of your child, because of the violence.”

Kate nodded. She reached and grabbed Richard’s hand, holding onto it tight. 

“I know our budget is already tight and we already have Jamie—” 

“If it was Jamie, that’s what we’d want her to do,” Richard said curtly, cutting her off. “What’s her name?” 

Kate let out a sigh of relief she didn’t even know was holding in. 

“Frankie. Frankie Johnson,” Kate said. She wanted Frankie to know her mother. To know what her mother gave up for her. That her mother was going to come home at some point. Lisa would be back. She would. 

“Frankie,” Richard repeated, stroking little Frankie’s face. She squirmed a bit but didn’t wake. Kate smiled. 

“Want to hold her?” 

Richard just nodded and Kate passed Frankie over, watching as Richard cradled her gently. 

“We always wanted a little girl,” Kate said quietly. Richard was completely taken by Frankie. 

“We did.” 

Things were well. They introduced Jamie to his new baby sister—thankfully, he didn’t question where babies came from, though Kate was fully expecting it and was tempted to tell him that Frankie was delivered from a beautiful crane, because in some cases, she was. The slip of paper that Lisa left behind Kate tucked into her nightstand, in between the pages of her Bible and prayed each night that Lisa was safe and that she was okay and that she would eventually come home. 

Kate didn’t call it. Not yet. 

There hadn’t been news from around the area—Liverpool or otherwise, about any death of a young red-haired woman but they were in a war and you really didn’t know anything in a war. Richard went to work, Kate went part-time, Jamie went to school, and Frankie fit into their lives like a missing puzzle piece. 

Kate whispered her stories about her mother each night and wished that she knew Frederick so she could tell Frankie stories about her father as well. She deserved to know. She didn’t even know if she had a photo of Lisa. (Perhaps, when she was brave enough to call, she could ask Lisa to send one.) 

But Frankie’s first words were “Mama”, loud and clear, her small hands reaching for Kate and Kate’s heart just burst. She smiled more than she did on her wedding day and lifted Frankie up as she requested, hugging her and kissing her on the cheek.

“Mama loves you so much,” Kate said as Frankie tried to grab her nose. 

“Mama!” 

She rifted through her Bible later that day and dialled the number on the slip. No one picked up. She tried again. It rang out. 

Lisa was just busy, she told herself. Lisa wasn’t available at the moment, clearly. 

She’d try again tomorrow. 

The call with Lisa never went through. Kate called everyday. Each day the same, the operator telling her that there was no one there, that it was a public phone, that if Kate could just give him a name, he could help her out. 

But Kate couldn’t give him a name so she hung up. The small piece of paper was all she had. Didn’t even know if Lisa was in the goddamn country. Didn’t even know if she was alive—

No. Kate couldn’t think like that. Couldn’t afford to think like that. 

Wasn’t sure if she was mad at Lisa or upset with Lisa or just wanted her to come home, to take her daughter back because Kate was tired of feeling a sinking pit in her stomach whenever Frankie called her Mama and not Lisa. This should’ve been Lisa’s. 

Richard loved her like she was their own child. Kate loved her like she was their own child. Jamie was a little shy at first, but eventually he was playing with her in the living room, giving Kate a bit of a respite. 

She would spend days, listening to the happy laughter of her children, of the children she loved and the children she had with Richard, smiling brightly and caving into their demands. She hefted Frankie up—she was getting bigger and bigger by the day—into the stroller and told Jamie to hold on tight to her hand. 

They made their way to the small park right down the street, not too far off from where Kate had grown up, with the large hill and broken street lights. The park was new; it wasn’t here when Kate was a child and she watched carefully as Jamie settled Frankie on to the slide, sitting behind her as he pushed them down together. The sun was bright and the day was warm and Kate was beaming. 

As the sun was starting to set, she thought about Lisa, all of eight years old, dragging Kate’s hand up the hill to watch the clouds. She wanted that for her children. 

“Jamie! Frankie!” 

“Yes Mum?” they replied, ears almost perking up. Jamie was holding onto Frankie as they were at the top of the slide. 

“One more turn, but then it’s time to go! Mummy wants to show you something,” she called, smiling as Frankie pouted and Jamie scowled. “Last time,” she warned as they slid down and raced back up again, running over to the playground and stopping them at the bottom. They barrelled into her lap with peals of laughter and Kate joined them. 

“Come on now,” she hurried, strapping Frankie into the stroller. “Mummy has a surprise.” 

Jamie tilted his head and looked at her in interest. He looked exactly like his father. “What, Mum?” Kate smiled and grabbed his hand. 

“Well, then it wouldn’t be a surprise, would it?” 

They made their way up the street, a couple blocks away from Kate’s childhood home. The hill had flattened a little due to development, but it was still steep. Steep enough for Jamie to complain and whine about why Frankie got to sit in the stroller. 

“She’s much younger than you, dear,” Kate explained patiently as they reached the top. The grassy meadows were gone, replaced by rows upon rows of housing, but there was a small bench right beside a tree and Kate gestured Jamie over. 

The sight stole her breath away. It was just the same as it was, some odd-twenty years ago, when Lisa had grabbed her hand and her heart. Woodschurch seemed to stretch for ages up here. It almost looked like Liverpool, with all its homes and gardens but the difference was that this was Kate’s home, the place where Kate grew up and the place where Kate came back to raise her children. 

She lifted Frankie from the stroller, holding her on her lap as she and Jamie sat down on the bench. 

“Your mother showed me this place,” Kate whispered into Frankie’s ear, bouncing her on her knee. She looked over at Jamie. “When we were young, just like you,” she teased, pinching his nose. He squirmed and crossed his arms. 

“I’m a big boy!” he exclaimed, puffing out his chest. Kate laughed and Frankie giggled too. 

“Jamie big boy,” she said, pointing at him with a smile. His cheeks turned a little red, along with the tips of his ears and Kate couldn’t stop grinning at them both. “Pretty colours!” 

The sun was setting, basking the whole city in a warm glow. Pretty colours indeed. Lisa wasn’t here, but she was in the air, in the sky, in everything around them. Kate held both her children close, the son she always wanted and the daughter she didn’t expect to have, and they sat there, at the top of hill where Kate had her childhood dreams, watching as the future danced before them, a long, bright, warm road ahead. 

_Dear Kate,_

_Sorry it’s been so long and I hadn’t dared write sooner. Also, sorry about not being at the number I gave you—complications rose and I had to leave. I just want you to know that I’m okay. Please tell Frankie that I love her. I miss her so much and I hope she’s being a good girl for you._

_I hope to be back soon. Thank you so much for all you’ve done Kate. Don’t think that I don’t know that. Don’t think I don’t know what you’ve given up. Thank you so much. I’ll be in touch—I wish I could give you some contact, but I can’t right now. Even this letter is risky. Please don’t come looking for me and I hope you’re well. Stay safe out there Kate—I don’t know how long this war will be and as small Woodschurch is, well, everyone said Baskerville was small._

_You’re always in my thoughts. I hope I’m in yours. Tell Frankie I love her more than anything in the world._

_Yours,_

_Lisa_

The war ended on a chilly September morning in 1945 when Jamie was seven and Frankie was three and Richard was beaming and Kate with a lighter heart than she had in years. The cheers from the streets rolled into their home, loud, jubilant, and clear while little Frankie clapped her hands to the music and Kate and Richard danced together in the living room. 

“Hip, hip, hooray,” Richard joked, twirling Kate around. Jamie barrelled into the room, with a British flag in hand. 

“Dance with me, darling,” Kate exclaimed, grabbing her son’s hand. He blushed. 

“Mum!” he protested, but held onto Kate. 

“Jamie,” Richard said sternly, but from the smile on his face, he clearly didn’t mean it. The sky was clear and the day was bright and they had just won the war and Kate wondered if this meant that Lisa could come home. 

Letters came and went, with no address for Kate to write back to, so she treasured them between the pages of the Bible that she had tucked Lisa’s number into those years ago when Frankie landed in her arms and their small family of three became four. 

Jamie laughed as Kate spun him around the room with two arms, smiling as he urged her faster, faster, faster Mummy! Richard eventually joined them, the three making a small circle in the living room to which Frankie crawled into the middle of and all Kate could think about how this was her family, the one that she made and the one that Lisa gave her, the one that Lisa should’ve been here for, when she looked into Richard’s eyes with their children around them, she smiled brighter than she ever had. 

Loved this life, loved her family, loved her husband. 

Was it wrong to want Lisa in a moment like this? Wrong to want anything more than this bliss that God had given her? 

She kissed Richard hard that night, let him take her to bed like she had the nights they were first married, but she thumbed through Lisa’s letters right before falling asleep, thinking of her words and yes, yes, she was always in her thoughts. 

_Dear Kate,_

_I apologize for the small stint of silence there. The war has just ended and I am hoping to come home soon—I know I keep on saying that, but this time it may be for real. I can finally give you a forwarding address to reply to—I’ve included it apart from this letter lest someone find it—and I am very excited to finally hear something from you Kate. Like always, tell Frankie that I love her. If it wasn’t too much of a bother, do you mind sending some photographs? It’s been years and whilst I can picture her in my head everyday, I’d love a picture._

_I hope you, Richard, and Jamie are doing well. You deserve it. It’s been a hard couple of years and if it’s any family that needs a rest, it’s the Barkley household. I know how hard you’ve been working. If there’s a time to take a break, it’s now Kate._

_Please continue to stay safe; there’s really no knowing of how things may shake out afterwards, but I hope you’re happy everyday. I hope you’ve got that, coming back to little Woodschurch. Hope to see a reply from you soon and I wish your family the very best._

_Your friend,_

_Lisa_

Richard threw up the next morning. If it had been anyone else, Kate wouldn’t be worried, but she remembered the days Richard was in the hospital, the days where he barely recognized her and rushed him to a doctor right after. 

“It was a good thing you caught this early, Mrs. Barkley,” the nurse said, looking at her knowingly. “You’re lucky you’ve got such a perspective wife, Private Barkley.” 

Richard just grimaced and sat back in the bed. Leukemia, the doctor had said. It was a type of cancer. 

Kate stopped listening after cancer. She clutched onto Richard’s hand. God, he had survived the war, and now this? Kate wanted to curse. Wanted to raise her finger to God and swear him off, because damn Him! They had gone through so much—the loss of a child, Richard in the war, Lisa leaving and possibly never coming back. She wanted to scream at the doctor, that he must’ve been wrong because Richard was a young and healthy man and there was _absolutely nothing wrong!_

The doctor looked at her sadly and the nurse looked at her sadly and she didn’t want their pity. Kissed Richard on the car ride home and decided it would be best to wait a couple of days—when they knew more, they told themselves—to tell the children. 

Jamie loved his father. Frankie loved him too. Somedays, it pained Kate to hear Frankie call them Mama and Papa, because that should’ve been for Lisa and Frederick, because this was their daughter and they deserved to hear those words but they were God-knows-where and Frankie was with Kate and Frankie was their daughter and Kate loved her with all the world. 

“Katie,” Richard began as they settled in for bed, brushing her hair out of her eyes. “If I don’t—”

“Richard, I don’t want to talk about it,” Kate said quietly, turning off the light. 

“Katie, we have to face the realities,” Richard began. 

“No, we don’t,” was all she said, firm, cutting him off. Threw the covers over and turned her back to him. 

There simply were no realities. Richard had survived a war. He would survive this too, because if he didn’t, then Kate would just bring him back. Richard wasn’t leaving. He was a father and he was a husband and for the first time in a long time, Kate went to bed with a guilt in her gut she could explain but didn’t want to. 

_Darling Kate,_

_Thank you so much for the photograph of Frankie. It’s tucked away into my coat pocket right now, on the left side, right above my heart. Thank you so much. She’s getting so big—she was such a wee thing when she was born! I keep on promising that I’ll be back soon, but to be completely honest Kate, I’m really not sure. There’s not much more I can say about it, but I hope you and your family are well._

_Tell Frankie I love her. I wish you every happiness, Kate. You deserve it._

_Always,_

_Lisa_

Kate had to scale back work again, after she’d just returned to full-time teaching when it was clear that Richard was getting sicker. He was in bed for most of the day, and while he was able to watch Frankie and Jamie for some time, Kate could tell it was getting too much. 

It was another session of radiation today. Kate hated them, but she doubted she hated them more than Richard did, who gave her a wan smile as they exited the hospital and she kissed him gently. 

“I’m so proud of you,” she whispered as she helped him into the front seat. 

“Oh Katie,” was all he said, holding onto her hand as she drove. 

She read through Lisa’s letters once they got back, right before dinner. Her Bible was no longer tucked in her nightstand, but now in the top kitchen cabinet because Kate was always in the kitchen now, even when she worked because the bedroom was for Richard and Jamie and Frankie shared one and she wished that they had the funds for a larger place but they barely had them for meals for the next week. 

She kept Lisa’s forwarding address hidden in her sock drawer, with the necklace of pearls that Richard’s mother had given her, tucked away in the back, away from the world. It wasn’t as if she needed it—she had memorized it long ago.

Frankie was shooting up like a tree, just like Jamie had and she was starting school in the fall. Her backpack was almost too big for her—it was Jamie’s hand-me-down and she beamed to have something of her brother’s. 

Richard was still sick and Lisa was still gone, but for now, things were about as good as they were going to get and Kate hummed as she made dinner for her family, the people that she loved, the people that she would do anything for, and when Frankie and Jamie bounded in from the living room with screams and laughs and paper planes, all Kate could do was smile and join them.

Her family. The one she had made and loved and cherished. Her family. 

Richard’s next round of radiation went well. His doctor told her with her hand clasped in his and with a small smile of hope on his face and Kate kissed him hard when they got home. 

“I love you,” she whispered in his ear. He smiled. 

“I love you too, Katie,” he whispered back, kissing her softly. “Thank you for staying with me.”

“Where else would I be?” 

Richard stopped and looked at her knowingly. She didn’t say anything. 

“Thank you, Katie,” was all he said and Kate kissed him and kissed him and kissed him. 

_Dear Kate,_

_I am in America! I’ve never left the country before and this is a new one. I’ve sent a couple of photos as well, they’re tucked away in the envelope. Everything is so big here, compared to England. And my gosh, everyone speaks so differently! I’ll have to work on my American accent. I’ve included a new forwarding address so you can reach me here as well._

_I hope you’re doing well. Tell Frankie that I love her. I would love to meet her one day—she’s gotten so big from your last photo! Tell her that I wished her a very happy first day of school. Things seem to be going well for you, with you back to work and both children in school. You better be doing some things that make you happy too, Kate Barkley. I know how hard you can work yourself sometimes._

_I’m off to Boston soon, having just landed in New York. The trip wasn’t as bad as everyone had told me, but I shall keep you updated! If I ever have the chance, I’d love to show you around here. It’s like a whole different planet._

_Tell Frankie again that I love her. Thank you so much for everything you’ve done, Kate. Truly. It means so much to me. I wish so much for you._

_Love,_

_Lisa_

Richard’s cancer was gone. Just like that. After one odd appointment, the doctor had told them with bright eyes and wide smile that they were cleared, that Richard was okay, and Kate felt like crying—Kate was crying and she hugged the doctor so hard she thought she heard him choke a little. 

Kissed Richard like it was their wedding day all over again, like they were young and foolish and very much in love. 

She prayed to God that night, thanking Him for everything he had done, asking for forgiveness for all the things she’d said during Richard’s sickness, and told Jamie and Frankie with joy that their father was okay, that he was going to be just fine, that everything was finally okay and that they had nothing to worry about. 

“I love you both very, very much, okay?” Kate said, pulling both of them in, now Jamie nine and Frankie five, kissing them both on their foreheads. 

“Ew, Mum!” Jamie exclaimed, shying away but Kate couldn’t be fooled. Frankie giggled and wrapped her arms as much as she could around Kate’s waist. 

“Don’t you ever forget that,” she added, tickling them both into fits of laughter. She spotted Richard come into the room in the corner of her eye, joining her. 

“Mummy, Mummy!” Jamie gasped, eyes tearing up from laughing so hard. “Okay, okay, I give in! I love you!” 

Kate just grinned. 

_Her_ family. There was nothing she wouldn’t do to keep it that way. 

_Kate,_

_I will be at the place where we first danced at 2300 today. Please be there and you must be alone. Do not tell anyone else about this. This is my one chance._

The bar was a crowded and very loud when Kate came in. It hadn’t changed much over the years and she frantically looked around for a redhead with bright green eyes and a smile brighter than the sun. 

She didn’t find it. Slightly dismayed, she sat down at the bar and ordered a whiskey, neat. 

“Put it on my tab,” a voice said from behind her and Kate whipped around. 

And there she was, after all these years, after all this time. 

Her hair was now brown and she was dressed in dark clothes, sunglasses perched on her head and a wicked smile on her lips. She was just as beautiful as Kate remembered. 

“Lisa,” she breathed. She saw Frankie in her cheeks, in the way she held herself, in that determined gaze. Even if they didn’t look alike, Frankie was very bit her mother. “It’s, it’s good to see you.” 

Lisa tilted her head. “It’s very good to see you.” 

And Lisa pulled her away into the bathroom, grabbing her hand and kissed her against the locked door. It was warm and it was soft and it was frantic, filled with want and need after all these years and it was Lisa, the woman she’d never thought she’d see again, and Kate was just melting in her hands. 

“Sorry, I don’t have much time. I just wanted to see you,” Lisa said, pulling away, slightly breathless. Kate was sure her lipstick was messed up, because she brushed a bit of it off of the corner of Lisa’s lip. 

“It’s been so long—”

“I’m sorry I don’t have more time. I just wanted to tell you that I won’t be writing for a little while,” she said. Her voice sounded a little American. Kate stiffened. 

“You came all the way here to say that?” 

Lisa smiled at her softly. “Tell Frankie that I love her.” 

She kissed Kate again. 

“I’ll be in contact when I can,” she said, her forehead against Kate’s. Her breath was warm and her skin was warm and this was Lisa, her childhood friend, the mother of her child, the woman she had loved—

And she was out the door and Kate wanted to run after her, to grab her hand, to kiss her one more time, but she stayed in the bathroom, catching her breath, her heart in her throat. Went home to Richard who was already asleep and tried not to think about Lisa and her kisses and Lisa after so many years and Lisa, Lisa, Lisa. 

Kate didn’t get a letter for three years.

Life went on. Her children started to grow up; Jamie was starting secondary school and Frankie was almost finished primary. She loved Richard, loved her work—she worked at the primary school Frankie went to and loved to see her daughter roll her eyes at her whenever they passed through the halls—and came home to two beautiful children, a loving and healthy husband, and things were good for a while. 

Lisa’s letters stayed in her Bible, tucked behind the baking supplies in the upper left cabinet. Kate didn’t read them very often, not anymore. 

She had a wonderful life. A loving one. There was nothing more she would want. 

Or at least that’s what she told herself. 

She watched as Jamie grew into a kind, warmhearted, and sometimes obnoxious young man and Frankie into a bright, strong-minded, young woman who seemed to model after her mother so much it made Kate’s heart hurt. 

The world moved around them as the decade flipped, changed, and Richard landed a promotion that couldn’t have come sooner because even with Kate’s job, sometimes they still had to make do and some extra money never hurt. 

There was so much she wanted to give to her children—a better home, a better school, a better neighbourhood, but there was only so much she could do so when Frankie asked her to tell her about her mother—about Lisa, she clarified, because Kate was her mother more than anything else in the world—Kate gladly said yes and sat them down on the couch in the living room.

“Your mother was my best friend,” Kate began. _Is. Is my best friend._ “We grew up on the same street; she was just a couple streets down. I took you and Jamie when you were younger.” 

Frankie sat up straighter, her eyes curious. “Can you take me sometime again?” 

Kate tried to smile and wrapped an arm around her shoulders. “Of course. Your mother was the brightest person in the room,” she continued, thinking about the way Lisa kissed her, the way that she always did, about how she hadn’t written in over three years. 

“Was she like me?” Frankie asked, giggling. She cuddled up against Kate. Kate smiled, a real one this time. 

“Yes, she was just like you.” 

They sat in silence for a while, with Frankie warmly pressed up against Kate, like Kate was her anchor. Kate had stopped being mad with Lisa long ago. Now, she was just thankful that her best friend had given her such a wonderful gift. 

“Why did she leave?” 

Kate sighed and pinched her nose. It wasn’t the first time Frankie had asked and it wasn’t the first time Kate hadn’t known what the hell to say. 

“It’s… complicated, sweetheart,” Kate said, brushing at Frankie’s hair. “Things were very different ten years ago compared to today.” 

That wasn’t particularly true, but Frankie had asked her questions she didn’t particularly want to answer and if there was something that Kate hated most of all was breaking her children’s hearts. 

Frankie didn’t push like she usually did and Kate took it as a good sign. _Darling, I wish I could tell you. I wish I truly knew. I want your mother to come home just as much as you do._

“Tell me more about her,” was all she said, looking up at Kate with an awe and wonder that only a child could possess and Kate hoped that she’d given her a happy childhood, a happy life, one that she was able to cherish when she grew older. 

“Okay,” Kate replied, and wove tales of her early years, of how Lisa would drag Kate out to climb trees to the very, very top and see the whole world before them. How Lisa brought out the best in everyone, even Kate. 

_Dear Kate,_

_It’s been a few years. I feel like I’m always saying sorry with these letters, about how I haven’t written, but this time, I couldn’t be more sorry. Life got ahead of me and I know I must sound like a broken record, repeating over and over again that I’ll be back soon._

_In reality, I don’t know. The war may have ended, but the world simply isn’t the same. I’ve attached a new forwarding address in the envelope and if you don’t resent me too much, would you mind sending a photo of Frankie? It’s been so long. There are days where I wonder if she even knows who I am._

_I’m back in Europe now, though I miss England most of all. I miss you. I want to come home, to see my daughter, to see you again. There’s so much I want but there’s work needing to be finished up here._

_I hope you don’t hate me Kate, but I’ll understand if you do. You don’t need to even write back to this—just let me know you’re okay._

_I’m always thinking of you. Don’t forget that. Tell Frankie I love her._

_Yours,_

_Lisa_

When it seemed like Lisa was back on the Continent, her letters came more frequently. Kate couldn’t bring herself to sit down and write a long, lengthy reply like she did before. Things simply weren’t the same. 

She sent a photo of Frankie and Jamie together and left a small note on the back, letting Lisa know that they were all okay, that they were all happy, that this small family Kate had carved out of this harsh world was loved more than anything else. She took Frankie to her childhood street, the one with the big hill that wasn’t so big any more and the house that she grew up in and the house that Lisa grew up in and Frankie hung onto every word she said.

There were some days she wanted to burn Lisa’s letters. To tell her that she had no right interfering with her marriage, with her life, telling Kate that she missed her, that she was coming home when it was all lies. 

But she tucked them away into her Bible anyways and went to bed with Richard and kissed her children good night and was the good wife, the good mother, the token poor family that the neighbourhood always talked about how they were suited for a better way of life. 

When the snow started to fall, she thought of Lisa. Thought of their first kiss, all those years ago. Were they ever that young? It felt like a lifetime ago. Almost on another planet.

Then Richard was sick again and the sky fell. 

The Christmas tree was bright and warm and the scent of evergreen leaves floated through the house, fresh, minty, and as Kate watched Richard slowly walk over to the couch, it hit her that this would be Richard’s last Christmas. Their last Christmas as a family and she helped him sit down and kissed him on the cheek, held tightly onto his hand. 

The cancer came back, but this time, Richard was older, she was older, and he’d lived through a war and through factory working and while the doctor told them there were options, Richard was tired and so was she and Kate just wanted to give her husband a peaceful ending. They’d had a happy life together—two beautiful children, a lovely home, a lifetime of memories. Kate told herself that it was enough. It was more than enough. 

“Happy Christmas!” Jamie called, grabbing the bottle of champagne from the table. Now, taller than his father and way taller than his mother, Jamie had grown into a handsome young man finishing up his final year of high school with more job prospects than Kate had ever dreamed of and a crooked smile just like his father’s. Sometimes, if he tilted his head just right, he was a carbon copy of Richard at seventeen. 

“Darling, let me do that,” Kate admonished, getting up only for Jamie to push her back down again. 

“Mum, I’m _seventeen_ ,” he said, with all the gusto only a teenage could. Kate rolled her eyes but wrapped an arm around Richard, who was grinning. 

“Frankie! Come downstairs, dear,” Kate called. There was the scampering of footsteps from the stairwell. Frankie tumbled down in a red sweater and a bright red Santa hat. Kate smiled so hard her face hurt. Richard burst into laughter when she did a little dance in front of them, just as Jamie popped the champagne that was a little too expensive for them but Kate bought because it was Christmas and it was Richard’s last and it was her little family that she loved more than anything in the world. 

Frankie ducked to avoid the cork and the drink ran through the air almost like sparkles, matching the gold on the tree and the lights and the candles. Kate grabbed some glasses and Jamie poured four out. 

Richard was tearing up and Kate was the warmest she’d ever been in years and Jamie was telling some stupid joke and Frankie was laughing at it and Kate thanked God for this, for her small slice of heaven, for all the things she’d been given compared to all the things she’d lost. 

The snow came down harder but their home was warm and it was bright and they settled in for a Christmas dinner that Kate spent most of the afternoon preparing and they all clinked their glasses and said their thanks and wished for the best of each other and everyone knew, that this was their father’s last. 

After, when the food was finished and the songs were sang and presents exchanged—she gave Jamie a lovely set of books he’d been begging for and Frankie a new set of clothes and Richard a beautiful set of cufflinks—she put on her coat and hat and scarf and gloves and tucked her Bible with Lisa’s letters in her pocket and told Richard that she’d be back in thirty minutes and walked down to the graveyard. 

The wind was harsh and the night was cold and the lamp posts glowed in the dark and the snow fell harder. She shoved her hands deeper into her pockets, her left thumbing the pages of her Bible. 

She found her mother’s grave by memory more than anything else. The frozen weeping willow was illuminated by the lone lamp post off to the side of the cemetery. Kate knelt at the tomb, brushing the snow from the top and from the words. The stone was well worn now. Her mother’s name was still neatly carved. She ran her hand over it. 

“It’s been a while,” she started, letting the snow melt into her coat. “I haven’t thought of you for a long time.” 

She paused. 

“I wish you were still here. Seen your grandchildren grow.”

Her chest ached. Sometimes, if she wasn’t careful, she couldn’t remember her mother’s face. Couldn’t remember her voice. 

“I miss you.” 

She walked back home, freezing but warm in her heart, the snow blowing against her. Her coat was soaked and her feet were chilled and her hands were pale but her Bible remained in her coat pocket. 

Undressed and found Richard already in bed. He smiled when he saw her. His face was lined and he seemed so tired and all Kate could think about was when had they gotten so _old?_

“God, you’re cold,” he commented as she crawled into bed and she just laughed. 

“You would be too if you just trekked through the snow,” she quipped, kissing him gently. She turned and held his face in her hands. “I love you.”

Richard smiled sadly. “I love you too, Katie.” 

She burrowed into his chest, his arm wrapping around her. 

“Thank you,” she whispered. Richard looked at her. 

“What for?” 

_For a lifetime of love. For Jamie and for Frankie. For our family._

“For everything,” she answered, because that was the truth. 

Richard opened his mouth to protest, but she silenced him with a finger. 

“Merry Christmas, darling,” she said, closing her eyes. 

“Merry Christmas.” 

_Dear Kate,_

_Thank you so much for the photos of Frankie. I wish I could meet her. I wish I could tell her that I love her so much instead of having to hear it from you. I hope this reaches you in time for Christmas, because I’m always thinking about that New Year’s in 1940. Doesn’t that seem like ages ago? We were so young._

_I miss you, Kate. I want to come home. I really don’t know when I can. How’s Richard, by the way? I haven’t asked much about him. I hope he’s doing well. I hope your family’s doing well. Jamie looks just like him._

_There’s so much I want to say to you Kate. So much I want to tell you. There’s so much I’ve seen that I want to share. I’ll be home soon, I promise. I know I keep on saying that, but I will be home. Woodschurch was always there for me. I hope it’s always been there for you._

_Merry Christmas, my dear Kate, and may all of your years be bright._

_Love,_

_Lisa_

Richard died six days into 1955. They went to bed one night and the next morning, he just didn’t wake up. When Kate reached over to kiss him, she knew. He was cold but he was cold and peaceful and painless and she cried before she told the children and whispered all the things that she told him when he was alive because she hoped that he would hear in heaven. Hoped that he was watching her and their children and their family. 

It was by no means a particularly lengthy illness, but Richard was ready to go and Kate, as much as she didn’t want to, was ready to let him. He had given her so much. She could give him this in return. 

They laid him to rest beside Kate’s mother and Kate wished that they could’ve met because she was sure her mother would’ve loved him. Everyone loved Richard.

The funeral was cold and they had to wait until the ground thawed to actually bury him. 

_I love you, I love you, I love you._

She hoped he heard. 

Jamie was braving a strong face but Frankie was sobbing and once they got home, Kate pulled them both in a large hug, warm, tight, even though they were both taller than her at this point and told them over and over again how much their father loved them and how much he wanted them to be happy. 

“There was nothing your Dad wouldn’t do for you,” she said firmly, holding both of them close. “He was so happy that you were happy.”

Frankie just sobbed harder and Jamie’s face crumbled. Kate held onto them like a lifeline. They were, in sorts, exactly that. Their family of four became three and Kate was flashed back to the days of the war, when Richard was in France or Germany or God-knew-where and it was just Jamie and Frankie hadn’t even been born yet. 

She tucked both her children in that night, kissed them both on their foreheads and wished them sweet dreams like she did when they were younger. Frankie had stopped crying but Jamie was still tearing up. 

_I wish I could bring him back for you. I wish it more than anything in the world._

Kate slept on the couch because she couldn’t bear to sleep in their bed, sleep in _Richard’s_ bed because the sheets still smelled like him and his clothes were still in the closet and he was just everywhere. 

She had so much to thank him for, so much she was grateful for, but a small part of her cursed at God for taking the man that was her whole life from her, when Richard had survived a war, fought cancer, and finally lost. 

She read through Lisa’s letters that night, letting her words wrap her up in a blanket. They were dated all across the decade, _1943, 1944, 1945, 1946, 1949, 1950, 1951, 1952, 1953, 1954,_ the years spinning through her. Almost an entire lifetime. 

When she woke up, her back hurt and her eyes were dry but she still had Jamie, still had Frankie, still had their home, still had her work, and even without Richard, they would move on. Eventually. 

They had to. 

_Dear Kate,_

_I’m so sorry to hear about Richard. He was a good man. I can only hope that he gave you a good life. I wish I could’ve given that to you. It’s really nice of you to keep sending the photos of Jamie and Frankie. They’re both so grown! It’s amazing to me that the small boy who asked to play all those years ago is now graduating high school. And Frankie! My girl is starting high school. I couldn’t be more glad._

_Thank you so much, Kate. I owe you so much. You’ve done so much for me and all I’ve been able to give you is a couple of letters here and there and a promise that I’ll be back eventually. I don’t know how much longer I can hold on._

_I want to come home. I think about you all the time. Can you believe the last time we saw each other was that long ago? I want to come home, Kate. Please believe that._

_Thank you for all you’ve done. Frankie has a wonderful mother._

_Yours,_

_Lisa_

Life moved on. Jamie was offered a job in an office right out of high school and Frankie and Kate were there to cheer him on at graduation. They both wished Richard was there, but Kate knew that he was watching. Always watching, always there. 

“He’s so proud of you, Jamie,” Kate whispered into his ear as she hugged him. 

“I wish he was here,” Jamie replied wistfully. 

“I miss him too,” Frankie said, grabbing his hand. Kate smiled at both of them and led them to the photographer. 

“Come on, he wouldn’t want us moping around on Jamie’s big day,” she exclaimed, even though she was tearing up. Her baby boy, all grown. “I’m so proud of you.”

Jamie blushed just like his father and the tips of his ears went red, just like his father. Kate’s vision was all blurry. 

“I love you both so much,” she said, hugging them both. 

“Mum!” they chorused, looking away. Kate just laughed. 

Yes. Things moved on. 

Nine months after Lisa’s last letter, Kate was in Liverpool, buying some supplies for her classroom and visiting her father’s grave. An article on the _Liverpool Press_ caught her eye. 

_UNIDENTIFIED BROWN-HAIRED WOMAN FOUND DEAD IN LAKE. AROUND FORTY YEARS OLD. ANYONE WHO KNOWS ANYTHING PLEASE CONTACT THE POLICE._

There was no photo, but a chill ran down Kate’s spine. No. Lisa wasn’t even in England, she told herself. (But how would she know that?) 

Lisa’s hair was brown last time she saw her. But that was years ago. Many, many years ago. Maybe it back to red again. 

She bought a copy of the paper and when she got home, dashed out another letter to the all of the forwarding addresses Lisa had given her, all memorized like phone numbers in the back of her head. 

There was no reply. 

Kate called the number that Lisa had given her, long, long ago, when she first left—the one that didn’t even reach her in the first place. It no longer existed, the operator told her. 

After four months, there was still no reply. 

Kate went to the town hall to look for personal records. She managed to convince the clerk with a discreet bill slipped underneath the table to check for a Lisa Johnson. Any current addresses or numbers. Anything. 

“No, sorry ma’am, no Lisa Johnson here,” the young man replied. Kate twisted her fingers. 

“Are you sure? She grew up here; her mother’s name was Elizabeth. Can you check for an Elizabeth Johnson?” her voice was frantic. The clerk nodded and ducked back into the office. After a couple of minutes, he came back. 

“No, sorry again ma’am. No Elizabeth Johnson either.” Kate frowned. 

“Are you sure?” The clerk nodded. 

“I can double check if you’d like me to,” he offered. 

“Please do.” 

The Johnsons had been living here longer than Kate’s family had. She was sure she remembered Lisa talking about how her grandmother had also grown up in Woodschurch, how the Johnsons were always in Woodschurch. 

“Sorry ma’am. There’s no file for any Johnsons.”

Kate frowned. What was the boy that was Frankie’s father? What had Lisa said his name was? Kate racked her brain. 

“Can you check for a Lisa Lawson?” 

The clerk nodded and disappeared again. He came back, looking slightly annoyed. 

“No Lisa Lawson, ma’am.”

Kate nodded, dejected, and thanked him for his time. Went home and sat down in the kitchen, pulled out all her letters from Lisa and read through them all, combing for any clues that would tell her where the _hell_ she was. 

“What’s this?” Frankie asked, coming down for a snack. She grabbed an apple from the ice box. 

Kate froze. It would be easy to lie. To say it was marking. That it was work. But this was Frankie and she was now fifteen and Jamie had moved out and it was just the two of them at this point and she deserved to know. 

“They’re letters,” Kate began slowly, looking her in the eye. “From your mother.” 

Frankie stared at her. She leaned against the counter. 

“Oh.” 

Kate tried to smile at her.

“So, you’ve just been writing back and forth with my mother, all these years?” Frankie asked, slowly, as if she was thinking through her words. Kate’s tongue was sour. She nodded. 

“And you didn’t think to tell me, her _daughter_ ,” she added, looking carefully at Kate. “You didn’t think that maybe _I_ wanted to write to her, to speak with my mother.” 

Kate opened her mouth to speak but nothing came out. _Didn’t want to say that your mother asked me not to tell. She was coming back, she was always coming back except for now I don’t even know if she’s fucking alive—_

“Why didn’t you tell me?” Frankie cried, her eyes filled with tears. Kate reached out for her but Frankie flinched. 

_I wanted to, please believe me, I wanted to, I wanted to, all her letters are about you, darling, all our letters are about you. I wish I could, I wish—_

But she didn’t say anything and let Frankie run to her room. 

Kate cried over the letters. 

Jamie was drafted the next day. 

He called her after she made dinner and Frankie took hers upstairs because it was clear she couldn’t even bear to look at Kate and Kate tried her best not to cry when Jamie broke the news. 

She grabbed some cookies she baked the other day along with Lisa’s stack of cookies and made her way to Frankie’s room. Knocked gently on the door. 

“Frankie? Can I come in?” 

There was the shuffling of papers before a grumbled yes. Kate smiled a little and opened the door with her foot. 

Frankie was curled into the corner of her bed, nose in a book. She didn’t look up until Kate handed her the plate of cookies, of which she snatched. Kate would have laughed if it was a different situation. 

“I’m sorry I never told you about the letters,” Kate began, sitting down on the edge of the bed. She placed the pile in front of Frankie. “It was wrong of me.” 

“It was,” Frankie replied, finally looking at her. Kate twisted her hands. 

“Your mother,” she said, trying to figure out the words. “Your mother was very special to me. I suppose, I guess I didn’t want to share her.” 

Frankie tilted her head inquisitively. “Oh Mum.” 

“Here, you can read through them all,” Kate offered, patting the stack. “You can write her one and I’ll mail it for you.” 

Frankie gave her a small smile and grabbed the letters. “Thanks, Mum. I’m still upset, but thanks for giving me these.”

Kate nodded and pulled Frankie in for a hug. 

“What did Jamie call about?” 

Kate froze. She ran a hand through Frankie’s hair. “He was called up for the draft.” 

Frankie audibly sucked in a breath. “What?” 

“He’s going in for training next week,” Kate explained, keeping her voice as calm as possible. _It may be just the two of us,_ now, she didn’t say. But it was clear from the look on her face that Frankie was thinking the same thing. She smoothed her daughter’s hair. 

“When did you get so smart?” she mused. Frankie laughed, even though her eyes were tearing up. 

“Something I picked up from you,” she quipped. Kate just laughed and held her close. Held her close like she should’ve with Lisa. 

It’d been so many years. Sometimes, if she wasn’t careful, she had to think hard about what Lisa looked like. Had to think hard to remember what her voice sounded like. What she felt like.

She kissed Frankie on the forehead and left her to her reading. Phoned Jamie up again and told him that he was coming for dinner every night and that was final. Told Frankie she was going out for a while and walked to the graveyard where her mother and husband rested with her Bible in her pocket, but this time, Lisa’s letters weren’t there with her. 

Richard’s grave was polished and new beside her mother’s, which was becoming more and more worn as the weather came by. She placed down flowers at both that she planted in their front lawn after Richard passed. Knelt at them both and thought about all the memories they gave her, all the love they gave her, how even though they were both gone, they lived through Kate, through Jamie, through Frankie, and all the people they touched.

“I miss you,” she whispered, running a hand over Richard’s grave. “I miss you so much.” 

She placed the roses at the bottom. 

“I love you.” 

The leaves were falling and the wind was chilly but Kate was warm, wrapped up in the love the people in her life had given her, passed along like a token, something to give and give and give. 

Jamie came over for dinner the next day and the day after that up until the day he was deployed and Kate told him every single day that she loved him because she didn’t say it enough with her mother and she wished she told it more to Richard and wished that she said it at all to Lisa. 

Jamie left on a chilly day in October of 1955 where Frankie gave him a bear hug and Kate cried and they both watched as he walked down the street, until he disappeared into a speck and all Kate could wonder was how many people she was going to lose to stupid wars halfway across the world. 

She held Frankie tight. 

Snow that year came quicker than expected, as if it was a representation of Kate’s mood. With the house empty without Jamie and without Richard, Kate worked longer hours at the schoolhouse—because without Richard’s income it was somewhat necessary, but mainly because the house was so goddamn quiet and Frankie was holed up in her room the minute she got back. 

The grounds were slicked with ice fast and the entire town was blanketed in a white that Kate wanted to just scream and go right up to the British military and demand that her son come home. 

The body of the woman that was reported in the _Liverpool Press_ was never identified and Kate never found anything more of Lisa in Woodschurch. It’d nearly been a whole year and no envelope with neat script showed up in her mailbox. After a while, Kate gave up. Searched the Liverpool records and came up empty-handed. Wanted to check all the forwarding addresses Lisa had given her, but those were all across the Continent and across the west and Kate simply didn’t have the money. Wasn’t sure where to look afterwards. 

As the snow came down heavier a couple days before Christmas—the Barkleys’ home was just as warm and just as bright as it was every year, because Kate made sure that the first Christmas with just her and Frankie would be just as good as any other year, because she told herself that if she filled the holes in her family with something that was joyful and cheerful and lovely, it would work—she stopped by the graveyard, as she did every year. 

Her Bible was always in her coat pocket now and the snow was much deeper in the cemetery as it was clear that no one shovelled it. The weeping willow over by the river had been pruned a little and icicles dangled off of it, replacing its leaves with something much colder, much harder, and to Kate, much prettier. 

She knelt at her mother’s grave first. A whole lifetime, since she’d seen Mother. Sometimes, it was like she was nothing more than memory in Kate’s life. Nothing more than the beginning. 

“I hope you’re happy where you are now,” she whispered, tracing a finger over her mother’s name. “I hope you were able to have that.” 

She didn’t say _I miss you_ because that wasn’t really true anymore. She bowed her head and said a prayer. It’d been a while since she’d said one of those too. 

The Bible may have sat in her pocket, but it’d been nearly a decade since she’d gone to church. She stood over Richard’s grave next, brushing the snow off of it like she had with her mother’s. 

“I miss you,” she said, because with Richard it was true and it was aching and she didn’t think that there’d be a single day in her life where she didn’t miss Richard. He had given her so much. Given her more than she would ever deserve. 

“I love you,” she added, because that was true too and she had photographs of Richard all over the house because she never wanted to forget what he looked like, didn’t want it to happen like it had with her mother and her father and Lisa. She didn’t even have a picture of Lisa. Hell, she didn’t even know if she was _alive_. 

If the world was easier, if God liked Kate a little more, there would’ve been a third grave beside Richard’s, with the name Lisa Johnson etched into it because this world would’ve given Kate closure, given her grief that she understood and knew how to deal with. It would’ve given her something rather than nothing, which reality had thrusted into her hands. 

She walked home in the sleet and the snow and came home to a darkened kitchen and living room even though it was three days before Christmas and Frankie still wasn’t really speaking to her and Kate just stood there in the doorway, with the mistletoe hanging above her and the tree unlit. 

She didn’t bother turning on any lights because it felt like a good representation of how her chest felt. Took a shower and made dinner and ate alone because she left Frankie a tray outside her door like she did every night and wished that Richard was here, that Lisa was alive, that Jamie was home, that she wasn’t so goddamn alone in her darkened room. 

Kate fell asleep on top of the covers with her Bible on Richard’s pillow. 

New Year’s came and went and Kate ventured up to Frankie’s room where she was blasting the radio that Kate had saved up for and bought her when she was thirteen. It was almost a year since Lisa had written. 

“Frankie?” she called, knocking on the door. She didn’t reply. “Frankie, can I come in?” 

It was silent for a while and Kate was just about to head back downstairs when the door creaked open. 

“Frankie?”

She was curled up in the corner of her bed, a book at her side and the stack of Lisa’s letters perched on her desk beside her schoolwork. Kate sat down on the bed, watching her daughter carefully and ran a hand through her hair.

“You’ve grown up so much,” she commented. Frankie rolled her eyes. 

“What do you want to talk to me about?” 

Kate sighed. Frankie was sixteen now. Kate suddenly felt very, very old. 

“You never asked anything more about your mother,” was all she said, looking pointedly at the letters. Frankie shrugged. 

“What more is there to ask?”

Kate stared at her. “Why she left? Why you’re here instead of with her, why she hasn’t written?” Kate raised an eyebrow. 

“I don’t care,” Frankie said, folding her arms. “She’s not really my mum.” 

Kate’s heart swelled and broke at the same time. She placed a hand on her daughter’s knee. 

“That’s not true,” she started, until Frankie cut her off. 

“It is. I haven’t even met her—I don’t even know what she _looks_ like,” Frankie exclaimed, throwing a hand up. “She’s a stranger to me, Mum.” 

She was right, Kate had to admit. Even Kate didn’t have a photo of Lisa. Nothing more than a memory and a couple of kisses. 

“You have a whole history with her, but I don’t know her at all.”

“But she loves you,” Kate tried, but Frankie shoved her touch away and shook her head. 

“That doesn’t matter. She wasn’t here,” was all Frankie said before she burrowed underneath her covers, clearly unwilling to speak any further. 

Kate sighed and patted her blanket-clad leg. “I love you,” she said firmly. “Light on or off?” 

“On,” Frankie grumbled from under the sheets. Kate smiled, just a little. 

“We could write her a letter together, you know,” she suggested, one last time. Frankie peeked her head out a little. 

“Maybe,” she mumbled, and for Kate, that was enough. She kissed Frankie on the forehead and closed the door on her way out, feeling a weight lifted from her chest. 

But everything crumbled the next morning when the door rang. 

Kate was scrambling around the kitchen, a couple minutes late when the loud _ring_ echoed throughout the house. Kate swore when she almost dropped the coffee pot.

“Frankie, I’ll get it,” she called as she heard her daughter’s footsteps upstairs. She yanked the door open.

“I’m not interesting in anything you’re selling—”

It was as if she was in one of those movies that Frankie begged her to see when they had enough money for tickets, when one of those glamorous stars froze in the doorway, jaw delicately dropped and hand on their stomach, the epitome of shocked grace. It was as if the world had stopped. 

“Hi,” Lisa said, waving a hand. 

Her hair was red again, but not as bright as it was when they were young. It was muted, with hints of brown here and there and she had aged—there were lines on her face that Kate had never seen before and she seemed a bit taller and fitter and just older, as if she had seen things she never wanted or expected to see. 

Kate didn’t know what to say. Didn’t know what in the world of fuck to do. Lisa, Lisa Johnson, was standing on her doorstep like it was any other day, like it was another cold morning and this was normal, like she hadn’t left her child in Kate’s arms goddamn sixteen years ago, like she hadn’t just picked up and ran one day and without much of a goodbye or a glance over her shoulder. 

Kate had lost so much. Seen so much. Grown, so much. She wasn’t the same person who had kissed Lisa on New Year’s all those years ago. Hell, she wasn’t even the same person who Lisa had kissed in the bathroom in the bar. It was a lifetime ago. 

She looked at Lisa, looked at her, committing every line, every angle, every crease to memory because she didn’t have any photos and she didn’t have anything other than her letters and her kisses and it had been so long that Kate wasn’t sure if Lisa was anything more than a memory. 

“I thought you were _dead_ ,” Kate yelled, hearing herself loudly. Her voice echoed off the walls. “Not a single heads up, not a single slip of ‘hey Kate, it’s Lisa, I won’t be writing for a whole goddamn _year’_. Not even a ‘hey Kate, I’m not fucking dead.’ Nothing,” she hissed, pointing a finger at Lisa. 

Lisa didn’t say anything. She just stood there. 

“Sixteen _fucking_ years, Lisa,” she snarled, stepping closer, close enough that she was right in Lisa’s face, close enough to kiss. “Sixteen goddamn years!” 

“Mum, what’s going on—”

Frankie grabbed her arm, grounding her. “Mum, what happened, who is this?” 

Kate took a deep breath. Held onto Frankie tight. 

“Frankie, this, this is—”

“Your mother,” Lisa finished for her, looking at Frankie. Frankie glanced between the two of them, her head whipping back and forth. 

“What?” 

Lisa engulfed her in a hug and Kate saw red. Lisa, who dumped her daughter, Kate’s daughter, into her hands over a decade and a half ago and now she had the audacity to show up here, treat Frankie as if she was—

“What the hell?” Frankie exclaimed, recoiling from Lisa. 

Lisa looked like she’d been slapped. Kate almost wanted to thank Frankie, to tell her right on, that even though this was Lisa, this was her mother, that she was gone for sixteen fucking years. 

“Nice of you to have finally shown up,” Frankie snapped, grabbing Kate’s arm. Lisa’s eyes were wide. 

Yes, Kate thought. She wanted Lisa to hurt. To hurt like she had. To know what it meant, to leave them for all those years. That her actions had consequences and she was seeing them right now, unfolding before her eyes. 

“You need to leave,” Kate said, her voice firm. She pushed Frankie behind her, as if she was protecting her. Lisa’s face fell. 

All Kate felt was satisfaction.

(A small part of her also wanted to pull her close, to kiss her, to tell her that she loved her, that she always had, that she always will, but she couldn’t, just couldn’t, after what Lisa had done. After she’d left. Sometimes, there were wounds even time couldn’t heal.)

“Okay,” was all Lisa said, and she turned and walked out the door, like she did sixteen years ago, when she dropped a baby Frankie into Kate’s arms and she watched her best friend turn a block down and disappear. This time, Kate just closed the door and kissed Frankie on the forehead and told her that they were late for school and held her hand on the whole drive there. 

Told Frankie to have a good day at school and that she’d be there to pick her up at the end of the day. 

Went to work like it was any other day. Taught class as if the love of her life hadn’t just shown up on her doorstep like some movie, like some novel, like her entire world hadn’t just been flipped upside down. 

At lunch, she ducked into the staff bathroom and cried. 

_Dear Kate,_

_If I’m lucky enough for you to even open this letter, I hope you’ll read this. If you rip it up, if you throw it out, if you burn it in the fireplace, I’ll understand. I always will._

_I’m sorry. For everything. For leaving, for not writing you, for not telling you, for leaving Frankie with you. There’s so much I want to say that I just can’t put down into words, never mind a letter. During those sixteen years Kate, there was nothing more that I thought about than you. It was always you. I wondered how you were doing, how Frankie was doing, if you were having fun at the new playground. If Jamie was there with his new little sister, if they were laughing and squealing and annoying you but you loved it._

_It was so good to see you Kate. It’d been so long. There’s so much I want to say to you, but if you don’t want to hear it, I understand._

_It was always you, Kate. It’ll always be you._

_I’m at 7643 Ritter Road. Come and see me if you can. But if you don’t, I’ll understand that too._

_Love,_

_Lisa_

Two months after Lisa showed up at her doorstep, Jamie came home. 

Frankie was ecstatic. Kate was crying so hard she could barely see him. They both hugged him hard and long and Kate whispered in his ear over and over again that she loved him, that she was so glad that he was home and made her way to the kitchen to prepare his favourite dinner.

“Nothing less for my favourite son,” she said, taking out the pans. 

“Hey!” Frankie said. Jamie laughed and tussled her hair. 

“I’m her _only_ son,” Jamie quipped, picking Frankie up by the waist. 

“Hey! Let me down!” 

Jamie just laughed and laughed and laughed and Kate didn’t think there was a more wondrous sound in the world. 

She shoo-ed them both out of the kitchen at their antics and played the radio that Frankie had brought downstairs as she listened to her children’s laughter and joy as she prepared the pasta and salad. 

As they sat down to eat, after Kate kissed Jamie on the cheek once more and hugged him and Frankie tight, told them over and over again that she loved them, Jamie dropped a perfectly innocent question. 

“Anything happen while I was gone?” he asked, wagging his eyebrows. With a pang, Kate realised that he looked just like Richard. Even seemed to stand like he did after the war. “You guys best not have just mulled around,” he joked. 

“Nope,” Frankie said, jabbing him with her elbow. 

“Frankie!” Kate admonished and Frankie just rolled her eyes. 

“My mom came back though,” Frankie said, casually, as if she hadn’t just dropped a bomb. As if this wasn’t the biggest thing that had happened to Kate. Everything was silent except for the clang of Frankie’s fork against her bowl. 

“What?” 

“My mom. Well, my birth mother. Lisa,” Frankie explained, gesturing for Kate to pass the salad. Kate did. Jamie looked at her, furrowing his brows. 

“I thought she had died,” he said slowly, looking over at Kate. Kate grimaced. 

“So had I,” was all she said. 

“Well, I didn’t,” Frankie said matter-of-factly. “Mum was actually writing to her, for my whole life!” 

Jamie stared at Kate. She didn’t say anything. 

“What?” 

“Yeah,” Frankie said, standing up. “Didn’t know a goddamn thing until I found her reading over the letters. Fat load of good it gave me,” she scoffed, throwing down her napkin. “Couldn’t mention a single thing, could you, Mum?” 

Frankie stormed up to her door. The door slammed shut and Kate flinched. Jamie was still staring at her. 

“Mum, what the hell?” 

She wanted to grab her son’s hand, to explain things, to tell him everything, but her tongue was stuck and her mouth was dry and she just sat there, frozen, clutching onto the tablecloth. She watched as Jamie left the table for his sister. 

She cleared the table and pulled out Lisa’s letter for the address that she’d included that Kate already memorized from the moment she saw it, like she had with all the other addresses Lisa had given her over the years, little hints as to where she was: Germany, France, Finland, Poland, Russia, America, bouncing all over the west. 

She put on her coat, left her children a note, and walked down the street, making a turn at the graveyard, to the street she had grown up on. The street that Lisa had grown up on. 

Found herself on the doorstep of a house she hadn’t stepped foot into for over a decade. The paint was peeling and it was clear that no one had lived there since Lisa’s mother had died, but it was still Lisa’s house, Lisa’s home, where Lisa was, and Kate knocked on the door, her hands shaking. 

Footsteps came through and Lisa opened the door, her face shocked when she saw Kate. 

“Hello,” Kate said sharply. Lisa stared at her. 

“Hi,” she said, sounding breathless. 

“Are you going to invite me in?” Kate asked, voice stern. Lisa shook her head, looking at the ground, almost amused. 

“Yes, of course. Come in, Kate,” she welcomed, opening the door further and taking Kate’s coat. “Thanks for dropping by. I, I assumed you didn’t read the letter.” 

Kate looked at her, her anger almost disappearing. 

“I read all of them,” she whispered. Every single one. _Cherished your words like I did with Frankie. I have loved everything you’ve given me_ , she didn’t say. 

Lisa turned around, raising an eyebrow, curious. 

“Come, I’ll put on some tea,” Lisa said, taking Kate’s hand and leading her into the kitchen. Her touch was warm and steady and solid.

Kate sat down at the dining table that was the same as the one she had eaten at when she was eight and had lunch for the first time at the Johnsons’ home. It felt like a lifetime ago. Lisa brought over two mugs and Kate gave her a small thank you. Lisa flipped her hair back—it was so long now, longer than it’d ever been before—and smiled at Kate. 

She was still angry. Long ago, she thought she wasn’t anymore. Wasn’t mad at Lisa for leaving. But seeing her again, on her doorstep, in person, after thinking she was dead or missing or God-knows-what, it stirred it back up in Kate. 

Still angry, but as Lisa sat before her, Kate took the time to memorize her again. Took in her eyes, her nose, her lips, her eyebrows, the small creases in her forehead, the lines beside her mouth. Kate never had a photograph and there were few things she regretted more than that. 

“I’m sorry,” Lisa began, speaking first. Kate tilted her head. She wanted to scream at her, wanted to yell at her again, wanted to hurt Lisa, to make her feel like she had all those years, but more than anything, she wanted Lisa home. And she had that now—or as close as she was going to get. 

“I’m sorry for leaving, for always promising to come back but never did. I owe you so much, Kate. I owe you my whole life,” Lisa continued, staring Kate in the eye. “It’s always been you, Kate Barkley. Ever since you asked me to play hopscotch.” 

Kate’s eyes were burning. Lisa grabbed her hand. 

“God,” Kate started, her voice cracking. “Lisa, I thought you were _dead_.” 

Lisa nodded, face solemn. “I know.” 

“A whole year— _nothing_.” 

“Yeah.” 

The words were on the tip of Kate’s tongue. 

But Lisa just held Kate’s had in the middle of the dim kitchen. 

“Do, do you think I could see Frankie?” Lisa asked, breaking the silence. Kate glanced at her. 

“I, I don’t know.” 

Lisa nodded. “She’s pretty mad at me.” 

“Yeah. I was pretty mad at you.” 

Lisa grinned a little. “Was?” 

Kate chuckled. “Yes.” 

She gave Lisa’s hand a squeeze. Pulled her closer. She was so warm. Close enough to kiss. Kate leaned her forehead against Lisa’s. 

“You hurt me so much,” she whispered, holding onto Lisa tight, like she was going to lose her again. 

“I know,” Lisa replied. 

“I missed you so much.” 

“I know,” was all Lisa said. 

_I love you, I love you, I love you._

She didn’t know if she actually said the words, but she kissed Lisa, tasting her tears on their lips, Lisa, all warm and solid and there, Lisa, her childhood best friend, Lisa the mother of her daughter, Lisa, the woman that took her heart in her hands and broke it but brought back the pieces, Lisa the one that she loved more than anything in the world, the woman that told her over and over again that she was coming back and she finally did. 

“I love you,” she gasped, breathless, because she’d never said it to Lisa and she never had a photo of Lisa and until a couple of months ago, Lisa was nothing more than a memory in the back of her head, lived on in Frankie and her eyes and her face and her walk. 

“I love you, too,” Lisa said, clutching Kate like she was her lifeline. 

And they held each other, in the dusty kitchen, wrapped in each other’s arms and warmth even though winter was just starting to thaw and spring was just around the corner and Kate loved Lisa and Lisa loved Kate and there were so many things wrong and so many things to deal with and so many problems in front of them, but Lisa was here, Lisa was in love with Kate, and her heart bloomed. 

Her Bible was still tucked into her coat pocket and Lisa’s most recent letter was amongst the thumbed pages. 

Kate just kissed Lisa and kissed her and kissed her and kissed her. 

So many things she wanted to say, so many things she wanted to do, so many things they needed to sort out, but they had time. 

They had all the time in the world. 

Yes, Kate thought as she kissed Lisa. All the time in the world. 

**FIN.**

> _“Go all the way with it. Do not back off. For once, go all the goddamn way with what matters.”_ —Ernest Hemingway 

**Author's Note:**

> feel free to scream at me in the comments mwah <3


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